


Aurora

by Nia_River



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Twilight Series - Stephenie Meyer
Genre: Alternate Universe - Always a Different Sex, Canon Alice Never Existed, Dimension Travel, F/M, Female Harry Potter, Harry IS Alice
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-03-05
Updated: 2015-08-09
Packaged: 2018-03-16 11:08:09
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 35,332
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3485969
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nia_River/pseuds/Nia_River
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Alice Lily Potter survived the war, but not unchanged. Pursued by those who regard her new prophetic ability as a valuable resource, and aren’t willing to take ‘no’ for an answer, Alice makes a difficult choice which sends her tumbling into the unknown. There, she finds a whole new world to explore… and love just waiting to be found.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So, I decided to be incredibly trite with the title and follow the Twilight series’ naming theme. ‘Aurora’ is another word for dawn, aka a _new_ day. And Alice finds herself in a _new_ world/life/etc. Yeah … it’s a stretch. I just couldn’t think of anything better. Sorry.

If Alice had known when she chose to return to life that she’d come back _different_ … well, she wasn’t sure what she would have done, to be honest. It certainly would have made her second-guess her decision though.

But the choice was made, she _had_ returned, and now she had to deal with the consequences. Chief among them at the moment: misplaced expectations.

“You have a _duty_ ,” Scrimgeour stressed.

“I have no such thing,” Alice stated coldly.

Kingsley, in whose office the meeting was taking place, watched on warily as the discussion grew more heated.

“You’re the Girl Who Lived, the Chosen One, the Witch Which Won—”

“Titles that mean nothing.”

“They mean _everything_. Wizarding Britain gave them to you in honour of all you’ve done for them.”

“The _press_ gave them to me to sell papers!” Alice snapped. “And if I’ve truly done so much for everyone, then it’s you all that owe _me_ , not the other way around.”

Scrimgeour glared. “So that’s it. After always being there for our community, after becoming a figure of hope, you’re going to be selfish and turn your back on us now?”

“I never asked to be a figure of hope.”

“But you are. And your gift could be the very hope of our nation.”

“Minister Shacklebolt,” Alice said, standing from her seat, ignoring Scrimgeour now she was sure he wouldn’t see reason, “I think we’re done here.”

“Alice, just…” Kingsley trailed off, darting a helpless look between his nation’s hero and his senior undersecretary. “Please, just consider it.”

Alice froze. “What?” she said flatly.

“We’ve been crushed by Voldemort’s war. Our economy is quite frankly for shit, our population decimated, and our foreign relations have never _been_ so rocky. And I’m not just talking about foreign wizarding communities—wizard-creature relations are in a crisis too. The war might be over, but peace hasn’t been achieved yet, and we’re so far from prosperity it’s not funny.” He gave a heavy sigh and ran a hand over his head and down his face. “Look, I respect your choice to turn down the Aurors —Merlin knows you’ve probably had enough of fighting— but maybe you’d be interested in becoming a Ministerial Advisor instead?”

“Kingsley…” She shook her head. “No.”

“Right, of course you’d be wary of joining the Ministry. Every administration you’ve witnessed has had machinations and corruption to one degree or another.” Kingsley ignored Scrimgeour’s offended huff. “It could be an unofficial position? We could have lunch once or twice a week and—”

“Stop! Just … stop.” She closed her eyes a moment. “You’re entirely missing the point. I don’t want to use my new power _at_ _all_. It’s… To call it overwhelming would be a huge understatement. It’s too much, all at once. I can hardly think.”

Scrimgeour scoffed. “Oh, I see. So the suffering of a nation isn’t as important as your comfort then, Miss Potter?”

Alice glared at him. “Not my _comfort_ you arse, my _sanity_. I nearly went mad before they found a way to supress my visions. As it is, some of my memories are out of order or missing entirely. I can’t remember a single thing that happened to me before the age of eight, or the first few months I attended Hogwarts, and second year is spotty at best. My head’s like Swiss cheese in places.”

Kingsley looked worried. “I didn’t know that.”

She sighed. “I barely like to think on it, let alone bring the topic up in conversation. I’m working on getting it back, but … it doesn’t look promising. Meanwhile, I can’t access my new power without severe risk. I’m training in some mind-magics that might help, but it’s going to take a while. I just can’t help you right now. I’m sorry.”

There was a long silence.

Finally Scrimgeour broke it. “I can see where you’re coming from,” he said in a less confrontational, but still persistent tone. “But we’re talking about the good of _thousands_ against the good of a single individual.”

And yet, Alice shook her head. “I know that. And only a few months ago, I wouldn’t have hesitated to volunteer my help.” She frowned, thoughtful. “I’m different now. My personality is different. Hermione thinks, and the healers agree, that in losing so much of my early years —at least half my _formative_ years— a lot of the experiences that shaped me as a person were lost.

“Judging by what I _do_ remember of the Dursleys,” she added grimly, “I’m not surprised I valued myself so little, and was so eager to do anything, sacrifice anything of myself, for praise or kindness or approval.” She gave them a defiant look. “I have more self-respect now. I value myself more. And I’m not apologising for that.

“Britain will struggle, I understand that, but it’s hardly doomed, and I won’t risk my sanity for anything less desperate than that.” Not unless her friends or loved ones were in danger anyway. Alice was no longer the sort of witch who cared to sacrifice herself for strangers and the fickle wizarding public, not any longer. “The ministry will just have to put in the work to fix things without my help, _as is their job_.”

The meeting ended shortly thereafter with no one really happy about how it had gone. Alice was in the elevator on the way to the Atrium when there was a jolt and it stopped.

“Power outage?” she guessed. But no, that didn’t make sense. “Ministry doesn’t use electricity, so…”

When it started again, Alice relaxed.

“Level eight,” the elevator recording announced. “The Atrium, including…”

Alice straightened and prepared to exit, only the doors never opened. And then the elevator was moving again, continuing downwards.

She tensed. Sure, it could be a glitch. The elevator _had_ stopped for a moment. But on the other hand, she hadn’t survived the war without becoming a _little_ paranoid. And so Alice dug into the mokeskin-pouch attached to her belt and pulled out her invisibility cloak. She wrapped it around herself and retreated to a corner of the elevator, waiting.

“Level nine: Department of Mysteries…”

Would the door open here, she wondered, or would it continue on to the courtrooms on level ten?

A pause.

The doors slid open and—

She silently cursed even as she praised her forethought, huddling down smaller as spellfire strafed into the elevator car. Wedged into the corner near the buttons, she was thankfully out of the direct line of fire.

Someone else cursed, out loud and loudly, then declared, “She’s not here!”

“Remember, she has that invisibility cloak.”

“Homenum Revelio,” someone cast.

Alice felt something swoop over her and said, “Shit!”

“She’s in there! Round the corner on the left!”

Time was limited as she saw a grey-cloaked figure —an _Unspeakable_ — lean around the open doors with wand drawn and ready to fire. The ministry’s anti-apparition and anti-portkey wards were too strong to escape that way. There was only one thing she could think to do.

“Dammit!” one of the Unspeakables cursed as she surged out of the elevator, knocking him over as she barrelled past them and took off. “Where is she now? Homenum Revelio! Everyone! Get a lock on her!”

“Homenum Revelio,” the others cast and then the chase was on.

Alice sprinted through rooms familiar and not: the time room, looking rather sparser than before fifth year; a library that put Hogwarts’ to shame; the planet room; an underwater room that almost had her drowning, until she quickly cast a bubblehead charm…

Eventually they cornered her. Alice looked around and wanted to laugh at the irony of the location. She was in the Death Chamber, being herded up onto the platform as they ringed the room around her.

“There’s nowhere to go. Just roll your wand away and surrender.”

“Like hell,” she spat. “What are you all even _doing_?”

“You’re master of the Elder Wand and a newly-awakened _Seer_ ,” the one who seemed to be in charge said simply. “Did you really think we wouldn’t investigate such a ‘mystery’? It’s the whole purpose of our department.”

“There’s no way Kingsley authorised this.”

“No, but in situations where we believe the Minister is affected by a conflict of personal interest, we can go over his head and instead get a majority agreement from the department heads.”

“Over his head? Behind his back, more like.” Alice was bitter, but not surprised, at the realisation that the Ministry was as morally bankrupt as ever. “And what did you have to bribe them with?”

The man shrugged, not even trying to deny it. “Not much. Just that your visions would be used to the benefit of the ministry and magical Great Britain as a whole … and a small favour for each of them. Lottery numbers, betting advice, that sort of thing. Just as a one-off.”

“I see. It’s like nothing’s changed, isn’t it?”

“Now put down your wand Miss Potter.”

She laughed harshly. “And be taken into custody and, what, experimented on?”

“You really have no other choice here. And we’ll do our best to make any tests as painless as possible. We’re not sadists.”

She didn’t believe him, not for a second. Besides, a cage was a cage however you fancied it up, and Alice was sick and tired of being at the mercy of everything and everyone, even up to _Fate itself_. Yes, she was through with having her choices taken away from her.

Many things may have changed since Alice’s memory loss, but one trait that remained constant was her ability to be completely, utterly, _recklessly_ stubborn about something if she thought it worth fighting for.

“Ah, that’s where you’re wrong,” she said smugly, taking a step back. She saw the way he tensed in sudden realisation, the other Unspeakables doing the same.

“Miss Potter.” His voice was anxious. “Just—”

“Live caged or die free,” she mused, and gave them all a vicious, victorious grin. “I choose freedom.”

Then, before any of the sudden spells could reach her, stop her, Alice threw herself back and through the Veil of Death.

* * *

“Well, this is … not what I expected,” Alice said slowly as she got to her feet, dusting herself off.

Not that she knew _what_ she’d expected. Dumbledore in a ghostly King’s Cross once more? Heaven, and being reunited with her lost loved ones?

Slowly, the runes on the Veil of Death lost their glow, plunging her into absolute darkness.

“Lumos.” Alice craned her neck to peer up at the rocky ceiling above and repeated, “Not what I expected. At all.”

She glanced again at the Veil of Death. It was eerie to see it so unmoving. Every other time she’d seen it there was an unfelt breeze gently blowing the curtain that hung from the stone arch. Now … nothing.

“Is it even the Veil I know?” she murmured.

It was a fair question, since this certainly wasn’t the _Death Chamber_ she knew. No, this was definitely a cave. A dark, echoing cavern, replete with stalactites, and with little to no resemblance to the chamber she had just been in.

“What’s that?” she wondered as the light from her wand caught and reflected something back at her.

She climbed over a ridge of boulders and around a corner, and there found the remains of a dagger of some sort. It looked very old, nearly rusted away. Alice was surprised there was enough glimmer left to catch the light at all.

More interesting though was the wall above, for carved into it were lines of runes—a message.

“Suddenly very glad I decided to follow Hermione into Ancient Runes, instead of taking Divination with Ron.” Alice stepped closer, holding her lit wand higher as she did her best to translate. “World, realm, kingdom…? Something like that. Traveller, if, belief… Suitable or acceptable? Or, no, worth makes a better translation. Then spill your life … no, blood. Spill your blood here and … judgement? Raise, rise up … worthy. Death to … unworthy?”

Putting it all together, she read, “Realm-traveller, if you believe yourself worthy, then spill your blood here. The worthy will be raised up, and the unworthy killed.”

Well that was … equal parts interesting an ominous. But not really helpful. What she needed to do was find the exit to this cave.

Several hours later, Alice was both frustrated and extremely hungry.

She’d explored every nook and cranny of the cave system and come to an unescapable conclusion: there was no exit. There _was_ a small side-chamber a few meters from the main cave with a pile of worryingly human-looking bones, however.

With a huff, Alice conjured a glass of water, hoping it would stave off the hunger for a bit. She regretted skipping breakfast now.

“I refuse to be trapped here,” she grumbled. “And I refuse to _starve_ to death of all things. Not after everything else I’ve survived.”

Apparition and portkey had proved as useless as her search. She could apparate within the cave, but not out of it. The same went for the illegal portkey she created.

She figured there were really only two options left open to her.

Alice approached the Veil. It was still unmoving in a way that sent shivers down her spine. Alice wondered if the Unspeakables were still waiting on the other side. She’d have a fight on her hands, but better a fight than a slow death of starvation.

She gathered her courage and, for the second time, stepped through the Veil of Death.

“Huh. Once again, you surprise me,” she told the Veil. She had passed right through it and out the other side. It hadn’t taken her anywhere. She could even see her discarded glass over on a nearby rock, exactly where she left it. “Well, that leaves just one option then.”

Alice picked up the glass and transfigured it into a knife as she approached the wall with its carved message. She glanced down at the rusty dagger, having a good idea now why it was there, as she dragged her own knife across the palm of one hand with a wince.

“Now what?” she wondered. “Do I swipe it on the wall, like at Voldemort’s cave by the sea?”

Before she could decide, a droplet fell from her hand and struck the floor. A low, throbbing, bell-like note sounded out, more felt than heard, as the ground below Alice began to glow. She tried to step back only to find her feet glued to the floor. The glow grew brighter, twisting up around her ankles like a fog of light. It reached her knees, her hips, her shoulders and then her neck.

Eyes wide and head tilted back like she was trying to stay above-water, Alice prayed, “Merlin, please let this not have been a mistake,” right before the glow enveloped her fully.

* * *

All her recent training in the mind arts was useless. The fog seeped into her, through every little crack in her mind. It saw her, all of who she was, and it _judged_.


	2. Chapter 2

Three years after her trip through the Veil, Alice was sitting in a little diner in a tiny town in America’s northwest.

“Here you go.”

She looked up and thanked the waitress before digging into her bacon and eggs breakfast. She wrinkled her nose as she realised something was missing and looked around. There!

“Excuse me?” she asked the diner at the next booth over, “could I borrow your tomato sauce? No, sorry—you call it ketchup here, right?”

The man froze for a moment, then reached for the bottle before turning to hand it back to her.

And then it was Alice’s turn to freeze.

The man was … well, gorgeous was the only way to put it. Honey-blonde hair, light golden eyes, and skin pale like alabaster. She suspected he was even geometrically beautiful, both halves of his face perfectly symmetric. Really, the single, small flaw he had were the shadows under his eyes, like he hadn’t been sleeping well.

Alice had never met anyone so flawlessly stunning before. The closest was probably Fleur or the other veela she’d encountered in her former world.

At that thought, Alice had a lightning-strike feeling of realisation.

He was too beautiful to be real.

He was _inhumanly_ beautiful.

And then she realised that the man’s eyes had narrowed and there was a wary sort of air about him as he set the tomato sauce down on her table slowly.

Oh, she’d made him nervous with her staring, hadn’t she? Probably, being a non-human in a thoroughly Muggle world, he disliked drawing too much attention to how he didn’t fit in.

Except that wasn’t quite right, was it? Apparently this world wasn’t _entirely_ Muggle after all. The being before her was proof of that.

And to be fair, she _had_ encountered the occasional human here and there with almost uncanny abilities. Abilities that she’d call weak, magical gifts, except that the people showed no other trace of wizarding or creature heritage.

Finally Alice cleared her throat. “Thank you,” she said, tipping the bottle towards him before liberally pouring some over her breakfast.

He remained half-turned in his seat, arm over the back of it and looking towards her. She noted how his nose subtly wrinkled as she took a bite. Not a fan of bacon and eggs? Or did her tomato sauce addiction put him off? It could be that he wasn’t a fan of human food in general. For all Alice knew, he survived on a diet of moss and moonlight. You never could tell with other species.

“I don’t mean to intrude ma’am, but I haven’t seen you around Forks before. Are you new to these parts?

One eyebrow rose and she took a slow sip of her orange juice to give herself a moment to try to quell the faint blush on her cheek. His voice was slow and pleasantly mellow, mostly generically American as far as she could tell, but with a faint drawl. Something southern? She wasn’t really great with identifying accents, especially outside Britain.

“I _am_ new,” she confirmed. “Just arrived yesterday.”

He tilted his head. “What could possibly draw someone _here_ of all places? _And_ from all the way across the pond? Forks is hardly a tourist attraction.”

She laughed lightly, noting that he went very still at the sound. Too still. “Oh, I don’t know. It’s sort of charming in its own way. Very green. And all the rain makes me feel at home,” she joked, referring to England’s own less-than-sunny weather. Alice paused then and leaned towards him, whispering in a tone too low for anyone else to hear, “You need to breathe or blink or something, or people are going to get suspicious.”

He did so at once.

Alice noted the faint widening of his eyes and the way he tensed. Should she not have let on, so blatantly, that she knew he was more than human?

“You never did say what brought you this way.”

Alice remembered, then, exactly _why_ she had come to this tiny, rainy town. After years of trying and failing to find Sirius, she had been losing hope. She needed a break from her self-imposed mission, she had decided, and had sat down to read her tea leaves with an entirely new goal in mind. Instead of seeking her godfather, she had asked for guidance, purpose and direction … maybe even for somewhere to belong, or people she could call friends and trust enough to be herself around, to openly be a witch again in this seemingly-Muggle realm.

Several more readings, of flame and mirror, and then a scrying with crystal and a map, and Alice had a destination.

Hermione, she was sure, would be properly aghast at her studies into Divination, a subject Alice’s friend had scorned so much as to _drop_ back at Hogwarts. But it was the only way Alice could tap into her prophetic ability in a controlled manner, without risking her sanity.

“I suppose you could say Fate led me here,” she mused with a wry twist of her lips. She had a conflicted relationship with the deity who had ruled over, and made miserable, so much of her childhood, only to turn around and gift her with insight once she had fulfilled the prophecy. Alice still wasn’t sure whether her gift was a blessing or a curse. She shook her head. “And I haven’t even introduced myself!” She held out a hand. “Alice Potter.”

He paused, but when he took her hand in his there was no hesitation. “Jasper Whitlock.”

His hand was cold in hers, and clearly unhuman to those willing to believe in such things. It felt like granite, hard and just slightly rough.

“If you’d like someone to show you around town,” Jasper said slowly, “I’m not busy today.”

She considered it. On the one hand, going off with a stranger was rarely ever wise. When said stranger was of an unknown race and threat-level, the choice verged on stupidity. But … there was _something_ about this man, this being, that drew her in. And strangely that draw didn’t put her on edge, but instead put her at ease.

Well, she _had_ come here seeking —among other things— companionship from someone who would understand. And here, her first morning in town, she had run across her first non-human in three years, someone who might not freak out at Alice being not-quite-normal herself.

While not as impulsive as she’d once been, Alice still knew when to trust her gut. Still … it couldn’t hurt to make doubly sure.

Since she hadn’t ordered tea, she would make do with what she had. Alice drained the last of her freshly-squeezed orange juice and then peered at the bottom of the glass, wondering as she did whether she’d be safe if she went with him. Her eyes naturally parsed out symbols and meanings in the pulpy dregs and she smiled to see her instincts confirmed.

“Yes,” she told Jasper, “a tour guide sounds lovely, thank you.”

* * *

Forks was small. She didn’t really _need_ a tour guide. And the tour was over almost before it had begun.

“And that … is the extent of our bustling metropolis,” Jasper drawled ironically.

They were walking down a fairly quiet street now, mostly lined with trees and all the lush green vegetation that grew so well here. It was raining lightly, more of a fine mist. They’d both drawn up the hoods on their jackets, but were otherwise unbothered by the weather.

“So what do you do?” At his cocked eyebrow, she elaborated. “Around here, I mean. For fun or a living, or whatever.”

He shrugged. “My family’s big on the togetherness. We go on camping trips a lot. I also occasionally work at Forks High as a student counsellor,” he said with a slight grimace.

“Not a fan of your job?”

“It’s alright. I’m just more for quiet is all, and kids are … noisy.”

Alice nodded, understanding completely. “Yeah, me too. Never much liked crowds or attention. A few good, close friends to hang out with is all I really need. Though,” she added wistfully, “I can’t say I never envied Ron’s big family, even if it was loud.”

“Ron?” he asked, eyes pinned on her.

“Childhood friend,” she said a bit sadly. “We lost contact.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay.” She shook her head. “What about you? Family?”

“Hmm. Esme and Carlisle Cullen are sort of like my parents, I guess. They adopted me and my sister, as well as a couple of other kids.”

“Oh? How many of you are there?”

“There’s the sister I mentioned: Rosalie. She’s four years younger than me. So’s her boyfriend, Emmett. He was adopted into the Cullen family too.” He gave her a sly glance. “You can imagine the gossip it caused in small-town Forks when ‘brother and sister’ started dating.”

“But they’re not _related_ -related, are they?”

“Nope.”

Alice shrugged. “Don’t see the fuss.” And she really didn’t. So they were adopted siblings, so what? She’d heard of pureblood wizard families that married first cousins, and they were blood related!

“Rose and Emmett finished high school last year and took off for college. They visit pretty regularly though. Edward, Emmett’s younger brother, is a senior at Forks High right now.”

Alice laughed. “And how does he like having you as his student counsellor?”

“It’s a bit awkward, I’ll admit.” Jasper shrugged.

“So…” Alice took a deep breath and adjusted her glasses as she gathered her courage. “Are they all like you?”

He was still walking beside her, but apart from that seemed very still. “How so?” he asked, an edge to his voice.

“Not quite human?” she said, and then he stopped completely. She paused too, and turned to face him. Maybe that had been too blunt? He looked on edge, unsure, and a touch dangerous with his darkening eyes. Yes, too blunt. Maybe if she extended some trust it would calm him down. And so, “I’m not entirely normal myself,” she confessed quietly.

“Oh?” The tone was absolutely neutral, not giving anything away.

Alice bit her lip, then nodded. “I’m a witch,” she confessed.

Jasper finally blinked. “A witch?” His tone was sceptical, but his eyes were assessing. “I can tell _you_ believe what you’re saying, but…”

“Maybe a demonstration?” she offered, and drew her wand from her sleeve, making sure they were alone and no one else would see. She ignored his amused look and mutter of, “ _Magic wand_? Really?” and pointed it at a nearby branch, murmurring, “Wingardium Leviosa.”

Jasper twitched, then stared between her, the wand and the floating branch. “So a witch is, what, a telekinetic?”

“A bit more than just that.” After another check to make sure they were alone, Alice dropped the branch and made a tree turn bright, fluorescent pink. Then she turned to a nearby road sign and transfigured it into a giant lollipop. “Impressed yet?” she asked Jasper with a somewhat cheeky grin.

His eyes were bright with fascination. “Very,” he admitted, and gave her an admiring look that made her blush, and which in turn made him smirk a bit, which didn’t help the blushing situation _at all_.

“Well…” She coughed and then quickly reversed her work before pocketing her wand and restarting their stroll. “So yeah, I’m a witch.”

“Are there others like you?” Jasper asked. “What’s the limit on what you can do?”

“Yes and no.” Alice felt a deep throb of sadness. It must have come through in her tone because Jasper gave her a concerned look and walked closer to her. She found his proximity comforting. “There were others like me, but not here. Maybe one, my godfather, but I can’t find him. The others I sort of … lost contact with.”

“Like your friend Ron?”

“Exactly like Ron.”

“Why not make contact again? You obviously miss them.”

“I can’t,” she said, pained, and was thankful he didn’t push. “As for limits … well, there are only a few. We can’t conjure food, or at least not food that has any nutritional value. We can’t create money either, so no get-rich-quick spells. And creating anything from nothing is exceedingly difficult and tends not to last unless it’s very simple. True love can’t be replicated, immortality is impossible unless you’re a genius alchemist, the sort that tends to come around once-in-a-millennia or so—I’m _not_ that sort of genius,” she added. “And lastly, the truly dead can’t be resurrected.”

“That still leaves a lot of possibility,” Jasper mused.

She nodded. “I does. Magic is pretty amazing really. Of course, each individual is also limited by their personal ability, generally governed by inherent power, intelligence, creativity and determination.”

“And how do you rate?”

Alice pursed her lips, considering. “Above average, but not extraordinary,” she admitted. “I had a friend, Hermione, who was an absolute genius. She could get spells right on the first try, and her magical knowledge was so far beyond any of our peers.”

“I’m sorry,” Jasper murmured. At her questioning look, he said, “For making you think about her. You’re obviously still grieving.”

Alice was surprised, thinking she’d hidden it pretty well this time. “Not your fault. And it’s been _years_. It’s past time I got over it really. I’m sure they’re all fine. Ron and Hermione are probably married by now.” The thought made her a little wistful, because she’d never be there to see it, but mostly it made her glad. She hoped all her friends were happy. “So what about you? Now that I’ve been incredibly transparent about my own oddness, will you answer my earlier question? _Are_ any of your family like you?”

Jasper gave her a long, assessing stare. Finally he said, “All of them.”

“And what exactly are you, if it’s not too rude to ask?”

Jasper looked away, uncomfortable. “That’s not something I really feel comfortable talking about. Not without the rest of the family’s okay.”

Alice bit her lower lip. “Yeah, alright. I understand. Not just your secret to tell, and all.” Still, she was a bit disappointed.

“Maybe … I could talk with them. See if they wouldn’t mind.”

“Really?” she asked, hopeful. She really _did_ want to get to know these people who were different too, if not like her then in their own way.

Jasper smiled a little at her excitement and Alice’s breath caught because, oh, that was a nice look on him. And then he smirked and she suspected he had caught her reaction so she huffed and looked away, possibly pouting a little.

Jasper laughed. “Really,” he said, returning to the topic. “Edward already broke the rule anyway. At least I’m trying to get the family’s okay before spilling the beans.”

“Edward’s … your youngest brother, right? He told someone?”

“His girlfriend,” Jasper said, shaking his head.

Just then the trees thinned out a bit as they reached the street on which Alice’s hotel stood.

“Well,” she said, “this is me.”

Jasper ducked his head, then paused and asked, “Maybe we could catch up again? Even if my family aren’t keen on sharing things?”

There was something endearingly shy about his request, and she got the impression he wasn’t shy often. So she smiled softly and nodded. “Sure. I could use a friend. Even if you can’t share just what you are.”

Jasper gave a sigh, and then another of those arresting smiles. He gave her a tip of an invisible hat, and a particularly drawled, “Till tomorrow then ma’am,” and turned and went on his way.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So basically, Twilight cannon’s Alice never existed. Instead we have fem-Harry (aka Alice Lily Potter) who bears some striking resemblances to the Alice Cullen we know. Her personality is different of course, but we have the visions, the amnesia (albeit less extreme), the messy black hair… She even meets Jasper in a diner because vision/divination led her there. So yeah, I had some fun with this.


	3. Chapter 3

“What’s wrong darlin’?”

Normally Jasper’s use of that term, in that drawling tone, made Alice’s heart flutter. Today she just gave a frustrated sigh and said, “I’ve tried to be patient, really I have, but stalking _is_ a crime, and I’m getting sick of it.”

It had been a month since Alice’s arrival in Forks, and she’d decided pretty quickly that she wanted to stick around for a while. That in mind, she had decided to buy a house. It wasn’t like she couldn’t afford it.

Negotiations with the goblins after the war had included a one-hundred-years banishment of Alice and her descendants from Gringotts—they’d been _really_ pissed off about the break-in and dragon theft. Lacking anywhere else secure to keep her gold, and still in the habit after the Horcrux hunt of carrying everything important on her person, the whole of Alice’s sizeable fortune had come with her to this world, tucked away safely in her mokeskin pouch.

Alice was pretty sure she could call Jasper a true friend by now, her first in this world. He’d even helped her with the house-hunting after she mentioned not knowing how to tell a good one from a bad one. Fortunately Jasper did, and explained things like checking for mould and termites, and water pressure and other things that went above Alice’s head. Eventually he just chucked and offered to come along.

With Jasper’s advice she’d purchased a pretty little single-storey on the outskirts of town, with a large garden she’d taken to spending a lot of time cultivating. That’s where they were at present. Jasper lounged on an iron garden bench she’d found and installed in her backyard, while Alice peacefully tended her new rose bushes.

Well, normally it was a peaceful activity. She was too frustrated right now to properly enjoy the task and so —after almost hacking a plant to shreds rather than simply pruning it— Alice set the clippers down with a sigh. She took a seat beside Jasper who, she noticed, had gone very tense.

“Someone’s _stalking_ you?” There was a low, growling undertone to his words. Almost a snarl. It was anything but human.

“He never approaches me, just watches from a distance. I’ve come across him at the library, in the grocery store … basically anywhere I go out alone.”

“Who?” Jasper demanded.

Alice gave him a hesitant look. “I’m not sure, but given the resemblance, and the fact he matches your description of him, I’m guessing it’s your brother Edward.”

Jasper’s eyes narrowed and he snarled outright, looking utterly furious. “That son of a bitch. What the hell does he think he’s doing?”

Alice was pretty sure she should be scared of his reaction, of the violence and intensity of it, but instead she found herself inexplicably _comforted_ by Jasper’s protectiveness. Not that she couldn’t protect herself! Of course she could. She was an immensely capable, rather dangerous witch, after rall.

Still … it _was_ nice being the one someone wanted to look after for once, rather than the one people looked to, expecting _her_ to save _them_.

Alice leaned against Jasper’s side comfortably and he relaxed a bit, the rumble in his chest easing as he wrapped an arm around her shoulders.

“I don’t get any dangerous vibes off him or anything,” she said. “Just … curious I guess. Maybe suspicious. Wary.”

Jasper growled. “He _has_ been suspicious,” he admitted. “Ever since I mentioned meeting you, mentioned you knowing I wasn’t human.”

Alice shrugged. “I get it. I understand why he’d be worried. But I’m sick of the creepy stalking. Tell him if he doesn’t cut it out, I’m going to get a restraining order.”

Jasper looked down at her with muted surprised. And then he threw his head back and laughed. Alice shivered a bit at the sound, and the arm around her tightened.

“Oh, darlin’, I’d love to see his face. Edward the goody-two-shoes golden child, busted for stalking and slapped with a restraining order.” Jasper’s chuckles slowly faded. More seriously, he promised her that, “I’ll talk to him. And the rest of the family too, while I’m at it. Rosalie and Esme will chew him out something fierce for his behaviour. And Carlisle will radiate fatherly disapproval. They’ll make sure he stops too, because as a family, we really can’t afford to bring police attention to ourselves.”

Alice nodded in understanding. “There’s one other thing,” she said, tone turning grim. Jasper tensed, looking at her with concern. “Please explain to your brother that where I come from, mind-rape is a very serious crime, and if he doesn’t stop trying to pry I’m going to take drastic action.”

“Ah. Look, I’m not saying he’s not doing it on purpose, because the stalking doesn’t speak well of his intentions, but…” Jasper sighed. “In Edward’s defence, he can’t actually _help_ reading minds.”

“What? He just does it on accident?” Alice’s tone was disbelieving. Because really, a _natural legilimencer_? Who’d ever heard of such a thing?

But Jasper nodded. “He can’t turn it off. He can try to not listen, to not pay attention, but it’s like … trying to ignore when people are talking in the same room as you, or something. The results tend to be hit-and-miss.”

“Huh.” Alice reminded herself that this was a different world to the one she’d grown up in—a world where, apparently, natural legilimencers _were_ real. “Well. That’s just… How do you get any privacy, living in a house with a mind-reader? Unless… Are you one too?” Alice had never felt Jasper try to breach her mental barriers, but maybe he just had manners and better control.

“Privacy?” Jasper grimaced. “There is none, really. And no, I can’t read minds. That’s Edwards’s gift.” He paused and gave her a considering look. “I do have a gift of my own though,” he said slowly. “I’m an empath.”

For a moment Alice’s mind went blank. Then she realised: empathy. Jasper could feel emotions. Possibly _her_ emotions. And her feelings around him … weren’t always strictly platonic.

Alice’s face was suddenly flushed red, her cheeks feeling hot enough to catch fire, and she tried to squirm away.

“Hey, no…” Jasper just held her firmly in place and leaned down to press a kiss to the crown of her head, which made her heart skip a beat … and which he could _feel_ , she realised, mortified. “No need to be embarrassed darlin’. I don’t mind it.”

“Mind what?” she asked, trying and failing to hit upon a guileless tone.

Jasper chuckled. “I can project too,” he confided in a murmur in her ear. “Want to feel what _I_ feel when you feel that way?”

It took Alice a moment to parse that, in her flustered state. Then she froze and considered it. _Did_ she want to know? What if he was disgusted? Except, no, he didn’t seem disgusted. But what if he was _amused_? He did chuckle, just then. Merlin knew it would hurt badly if he was laughing at her feelings!

Alice hadn’t been a Gryffindor for nothing though, so she took a deep breath and nodded.

And then she felt it. It flowed over her like a wave, thick and intense. There was gratification, like he was _pleased_ with her feelings for him, and a sort of soft joy, a contentedness. And then there was—

“ _Oh_ ,” Alice whispered breathlessly. “That’s…” _an awfully flattering amount of attraction_ , she finished silently.

She tipped her head up to look at him. His smile was small, but very present, and his eyes were darker, more honey than the usual light gold.

“Would you mind terribly, darlin’,” he asked quietly, “if I kissed you right now?”

Her heart skipped a beat. She answered without words, tipping her head back further and turning it just right so that—

His lips were firm rather than soft like Dean’s had been after the Yule Ball, or chapped like Neville’s had been in those frantic, hurried minutes they shared before the Battle of Hogwarts. And neither of those kisses had made her feel even a fraction as much as this one did. Neither of them had held even a glimmer of the passion that had Alice pressing into Jasper’s body when he wrapped an arm around her waist and pulled her into his lap, biting gently at her lower lip and then laving at it after.

Jasper tasted sharp and sweet all at once, and as his tongue lapped into her mouth, teasing hers, she griped his shoulders tightly and moaned.

He pulled back slowly, parting with a last, soft, chaste press of lips, and rested his forehead against hers.

Alice fluttered her eyes open. His eyes had gone from honey to amber.

“Well,” she said, and it came out throatier than she’d intended.

“Well,” he agreed, huskiness in his own voice.

He gently tucked a stray lock of her unruly, dark hair back behind her ear, then brushed his thumb against the soft skin there, slightly jostling her glasses. It was then, as she felt his wonder and awe, that Alice realised he was still projecting.

“Jasper?”

He gave her a soft look. “It’s just…” He shook his head. “Normally it’s so difficult, being around humans, but you… Your pulse is right there, under my thumb, and I’m feeling not even a twinge of temptation.”

Alice wasn’t positive as to what he meant, except that she was glad he didn’t find it uncomfortable to be around her. Still, she tucked that rather telling clue as to his nature away with all the rest she’d gathered so far to examine later. Then she let out a slight squeak of surprise as Jasper picked her up.

She wrapped her arms around his neck automatically, but was confident he wouldn’t let her fall. He carried her through the back door and then into the living room, where he settled them on the sofa and smoothed a hand down her back to hold her close. Alice sighed in contentment and curled into him, burying her face in his neck and inhaling.

“You smell nice,” she murmured. “A little like wood and cinnamon.”

“Oh? You smell citrusy.”

“Really? That’s strange. My shampoo is … cucumber and avocado, I think. Or something else weird and herbal. Can’t remember exactly.”

“I can smell that too, but it’s artificial.” He took a deep breath and his chest rumbled, not in a growl like earlier, but instead in an almost-purr. It made her shiver. “No, you definitely smell like something citrus, maybe oranges. And there’s a subtle floral undertone too.”

“Hmm.” After several moments of drifting, a thought occurred to her. “You know, I might be able to help you with that privacy issue.”

“What? Wait, do you mean Edward?” He paused and shifted to look at her, eyes bright. “Really?”

“Mhmm. It’s how I kept him out of my head all those times. A skill I learned. I don’t know if it’ll work for you —with the species differences and all, your brain might run differently— but it can’t hurt to try.”

“And it’d piss Edward off,” Jasper mused with an edge of both excitement and amusement. “Alright darlin’, I’m all ears.”

* * *

Alice was nervous as Jasper helped her out of the car and tucked her hand into his elbow. He often did gentlemanly things like that, and she found it rather endearing. Of course, other times, like when he kissed her, he wasn’t a gentleman _at all_ , and that had its own appeal.

“You’re _sure_ I look okay?” she whispered, smoothing the skirt of the pretty, green, lace-hemmed dress she’d chosen to wear.

“You look beautiful darlin’. But then, you always do.”

She scoffed and smacked his shoulder, but gently so as not to hurt herself. “Biased,” she accused.

“Guilty,” he agreed with a smirk. “Doesn’t mean I’m wrong. Now come on, they’re all waiting inside.”

Alice’s anxiety returned, because she was about to meet the Cullen family, others who understood what it was to be different, and she wanted desperately to make a good impression. The fact that she and Jasper were … something now, something more than mere friends, only made her nerves a hundred times worse. It was one thing to want to get along with potentially-understanding not-quite-humans, and another entirely to want to get along with _Jasper’s family_.

Suddenly she felt a spark of calm, come and gone as quickly as it came, followed by a brief feeling of curiosity. She knew it was a question. She’d explained to Jasper that she was uncomfortable with the idea of being controlled or influenced, and they’d arranged a way for him to non-verbally request permission. She gave him just that with a nod and feeling of eagerness, then sighed in relief as the calm returned, stronger and steadier, washing over her like a cool breeze on a hot day.

“Thanks,” she said. “Okay, let’s do this.”

The house, hidden in the woods at the end of a long driveway, was all glass and timber and shades of white. It was a thing of beauty, and she told the pretty caramel-haired woman who greeted them at the door just that.

“Thank you,” she said to Alice, smiling with pleasure. “I remodelled it myself. Come in, come in. We’ve been waiting _ages_ for Jasper to introduce you to us, but he’s been keeping you all to himself.” She gave Jasper a playfully chiding look, to which he ducked his head in equally-playful shame.

“Alice, this is Esme. Esme, Alice.”

“Such a pleasure to meet you dear.” Esme hesitantly held out a hand, like she wasn’t sure how Alice would react.

Alice had noticed how humans tended to avoid Jasper. Edward too, when he had been around doing his stalker thing. It was like humans had some instinct that told them to stay away.

Esme’s hesitation reminded Alice achingly of Remus, who had been so used to being avoided and scorned that he was afraid to hope for anything else. Those feelings had made it painfully hard for Tonks to convince the werewolf she was serious about him, but she’d persisted, and Alice was glad for it. She imagined they were living their happily ever after now with little Teddy, back in the other world.

Alice smiled and stepped away from Jasper, making the choice to not merely shake Esme’s hand, but to press it between hers, and then place a chaste kiss of greeting to her cheek for good measure.

“I’m glad to meet you too,” she said to Esme, who looked delighted and charmed. Alice relaxed back into Jasper when his arm wrapped around her waist, seeing a handsome, platinum-blonde man do the same with Esme. “And you must be … Carlisle?”

The man’s smile was kind. “Yes. I’m glad to finally meet you. Jasper talks about you a lot. It’s quite unlike him to be so verbose.”

Jasper cleared his throat, and the calm that he was projecting was momentarily interrupted by a surge of embarrassment that made Alice grin up at him. Jasper narrowed his eyes at her amusement and then rolled them and tugged her further into the house.

“Come on. The others are waiting in the living room.”

Alice first noticed Edward, sitting at a grand piano and staring at her suspiciously. Then she was distracted by two people standing up from their seat on a long, white leather sofa.

“And this,” Jasper said, “is Rosalie.”

At her first sight of Jasper’s sister, Alice was struck dumb by her beauty. She’d never even _imagined_ that a person could look so very beautiful. She didn’t attract Alice the way Jasper did, as Alice didn’t swing that way. And besides, she preferred Jasper’s _apparently understated_ perfection—not something she’d ever thought to say about him. Nonetheless, Rosalie was…

“Wow,” she murmured without meaning to, awe in her tone. “How do you _possibly_ pass as a mere human? You’re just…” And all Alice could think to say was, “Wow,” again.

She felt embarrassed as she realised she was practically fawning over the poor girl, but apparently her moment of being dumbstruck was exactly the right tact to take. Jasper had mentioned Rosalie’s vanity, but seeing that aloof expression suddenly melt into something a _little_ less cold as she tossed her hair over her shoulder really brought the point home. Alice imagined that if Rosalie were a bird, she would be preening right now.

Rosalie sniffed and glided gracefully forward, extending her hand with only a little reluctance. Better than Alice had expected, given Jasper’s warnings of her suspicious nature, her overprotectiveness of the family and dislike of outsiders. Alice firmly suppressed the urge to do something embarrassing like kneel as she took Rosalie’s hand, and kiss the back like a petitioner before a queen.

“Nice to meet you,” Alice managed to say.

“Hmm,” was Rosalie’s noncommittal response. She sat back down on the sofa and made herself busy inspecting her undoubtedly flawless nails.

“And the hulk over there is Emmett,” Jasper said.

Unlike his girlfriend, Emmett proved open and cheerful and enthusiastic. He greeted Alice with a grin and a, “Glad to meet the one making Jaz less emo lately.” He then ducked Jasper’s swipe at his head with a laugh. “And dad was totally right about how he goes on about you,” Emmett said, backing out of Jasper’s reach. “I mean, you should have heard him waxing poetic about your ‘gorgeous emerald eyes’ the other day.”

“I did no such thing,” Jasper snapped, and started growling.

“So did.”

“I _might_ have mentioned the colour when Esme was asking what she looked like, but—” He cut off as Emmett just snickered. Jasper pressed a kiss to Alice’s temple. “Excuse me for a minute darlin’. I need to teach the gorilla some manners.”

With a bold laugh Emmett turned and raced from the room, Jasper hot on his heels, and Alice didn’t miss that they moved faster than was natural. Nor did she miss the loud crashing sounds, like thunder, that followed shortly thereafter. Alice’s eyes went wide as she wondered if Emmett had a gift too. Could he call lightning down from the sky, or maybe generate thunderbolts? She hoped Jasper would be okay.

Edward hissed, glaring after them. “They’re not even _trying_ to be subtle.”

“Well, it’s not like she doesn’t already know, at least in part,” Rosalie pointed out.

He turned his glare on the blonde goddess. “I thought you were on my side?” He gave her a snide look. “Oh of course, but that was before she flattered your ego.”

Rosalie’s eyes narrowed. “And you weren’t _nearly_ so against her until she started teaching Jasper how to block your power.”

“I was _always_ against this. Bringing Bella into our world was bad enough,” he said in a heavy, guilt-laden tone. “How much danger is she in because of me? If the Volturi ever found out… We shouldn’t be repeating the same mistake with another innocent.”

Rosalie, with a sharp smirk, said, “I’m sure Bella will be delighted to hear you think she’s a mistake.”

“That’s _not_ what I said!”

“Rose, Edward, that’s enough,” Carlisle said in firm tone, and they both sat back, resentful but obedient. “I’m sorry about this Alice.”

“It’s fine,” she said faintly, but inside she was cursing Jasper for abandoning her to this family drama. “Plus, kind of my fault.” She _was_ the cause of the pair’s argument.

“No it’s not,” Esme said softly. “Not at all.”

“Hmm.” Alice decided to change the subject. “I don’t suppose I can get a glass of water?”

“Of course. I’ll be back in a moment.”

Just then Jasper and Emmett returned. Emmett tumbled down onto the couch next to Rosalie with a pout that a man his size shouldn’t be able to pull off. Jasper meanwhile was smirking.

“I take it you won?” Alice asked, amused, but also a bit concerned as she took in the tears in his clothes. At least nothing was smoking or thunderbolt-crispy.

Jasper’s smirk widened as Emmett huffed. “As always,” he told her.

“Liar!” Emmett yelled.

“I win ninety-eight percent of our fights.”

“That’s not _always_ ,” Emmett insisted stubbornly, crossing his arms.

“Are you alright?” Alice asked as Jasper reached her and wrapped his arms around her waist. She leaned into him, carefully checking a rip in his sleeve to make sure there was no injury underneath. “Not hurt anywhere?”

Jasper’s look was amused. “I’m absolutely fine darlin’.”

A clearing throat made Alice look up to see Esme had returned with her water, and was staring between the two with a pleased, fond look. Alice felt her cheeks heating and thanked the woman for the water, but in her fluster the glass slipped from her fingers and shattered on the floor.

Alice gasped, surprised to find herself suddenly facing the other way, Jasper curled protectively behind her. He had acted so fast she didn’t even notice them moving, and not so much as a drop of water had had a chance to splash on her ankles.

“Are you alright?” he asked tensely.

“Fine,” Alice promised, sending him waves of calm, meanwhile noticing the room had tensed as they all froze.

Carlisle, who had hurried forward, inspected her and said, “The glass didn’t get her. No injury, no blood.”

There was a collective sigh of relief. Like everyone had been holding their breath, and only now started breathing again.

Alice, meanwhile, stepped out of Jasper’s embrace to look down at the mess she’d made and cursed silently. “I’m so sorry about this,” she apologised to Esme.

“It’s fine dear,” was the gentle reply. “I’ve plenty of other glasses, and that one hardly held any sentimental value.”

“Still. I’ll just…” Alice drew her wand. “Reparo.”

When she looked up, most of the room had frozen and was staring in shock between the once-more-whole glass Alice picked up and Alice herself. Emmett’s jaw had even dropped.

Confused, Alice turned to Jasper in silent question.

“Well, since they weren’t ready to tell you about our secret, I didn’t think it was right to mention your secret to them either.”

Alice blinked. “Oh. I see. I suppose that makes sense, but I don’t really mind.” As she set the glass on the coffee table, a thought occurred to her. “But how _did_ you keep it a secret? I mean, before I started teaching you those mind-art techniques…” She glanced pointedly towards Edward.

“Just made sure to never think of it while around him,” Jasper admitted.

He gently took her hand as if to check it for any cuts. She was sure he knew better though because firstly, she’d repaired the glass before picking it up. She hadn’t touched a single speck of broken glass. Secondly, Alice had realised some time ago how sensitive Jasper’s sense of smell—she’d even taken to using air refreshing charms whenever she ate. The point being, she was sure he would have picked up the scent of blood almost immediately. Which meant … he was just using it as an excuse to hold her hand.

Alice’s knowing amusement must have come through loud and clear, because Jasper looked up at her through his lashes, quirked a grin and gave up on the pretence, simply threading his fingers through hers.

It was Emmett who broke the silence. “How’d you _do_ that?” he asked excitedly. “That was awesome!”

“Well, you see, I’m a witch.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It’s weird where inspiration comes from.
> 
> I have a thing for born-a-different-gender stories, and sometimes like to imagine what I’d call various characters if I wrote them that way: I favour Bella and Briar for fem!Bilbo; Natsuko or the popular Naruko are my fem!Naruto picks; and if I ever get around to writing that fem!Frodo-as-fem!Bilbo/Thorin’s-dwobbit-baby idea of mine, I’m totally gonna call the kid either Freda or Freya.
> 
> My _favourite_ fandom to daydream like this for is the HP-verse though, because it will always be my first and dearest fandom. (I’ve already posted one fem!Harry story before this.)
> 
> My main girl name picks for Harry are the obvious ‘Harriet’, and then various flora-related names starting with ‘H’ (i.e. Hazel, Holly, Heather, etc.). Apart from that though, I think I’d go for a name with the same sort of simple, classic, your-grandparent-might’ve-been-called-this feel as ‘Harry’. So I was brainstorming: Jane, Mary, Anna, Emily… and then I landed upon ‘Alice’.
> 
> For some bizarre reason, I immediately thought of Alice from Twilight. Possibly I read a Twilight fic recently? And then I thought (because my brain was still in HP-land): hey, if she was a HP-verse witch she’d be a Seer, but a good one unlike Trelawney. And then I thought: fem!Harry could be a Seer too if I wanted. And _then_ I thought: Jasper is kinda hot, right, and Twilight!Alice is his other half, so… Dude, I can totally write a crossover with self-indulgent fem-Harry(aka Alice)/Jasper! Yay!
> 
> And then in just one day, out poured, like, 10k+ words. Not a bad start, right?
> 
> (In conclusion: my creative process is weird (but I do love it when I hit upon a story idea that seems to write itself).)


	4. Chapter 4

“So, another world…” Jasper trailed off.

It had been a few days since Alice met Jasper’s family. The discussion about her status as a witch and abilities had gone a lot more in depth than anything she’d previously discussed with Jasper alone.

Carlisle, who Jasper had once described as, “a doctor at heart, and one of the most compassionate men I know,” had turned to be just as much a scholar. He had a boundless curiosity, especially about new things —very much a Ravenclaw, she’d privately thought— and asked a lot of clever, insightful questions. Before Alice knew it, she’d revealed her true origins and just why her people were now beyond her reach.

“I’m sorry that happened to you,” Jasper murmured, running hands through Alice’s hair as she rested her head in his lap. “I’m sorry you lost so much. Everything you knew.”

“Thank you,” she said honestly, because there was nothing pitying in his tone, only compassion and care.

She stared up at the green swaying above, the branches and leaves of the tree Jasper was leaning against, and blinked as they parted just enough for a flash cloudy sunlight to blind her. She wrinkled her nose as she squinted her eyes, then hummed as Jasper’s fingers plucked away her glasses so he could trace, feather-light, over her eyelids.

She felt herself smile as she teasingly said, “So, you like my eyes, huh?”

Jasper huffed. “Emmett is such a… I wasn’t _waxing poetic_.”

“So you _don’t_ like my eyes?” Alice blinked said eyes open and, staring up at his slightly-blurred face, gave him her best sad look.

Jasper’s raised eyebrow said he knew exactly what she was pulling. Which, empath, _of course_ he did. Nonetheless, his expression softened as he leaned down to press a kiss to first one lid, then the other.

“They’re beautiful, sweetheart.”

Alice’s heart skipped a beat. “Sweetheart? That’s a new one.”

“And you like it even better than darlin’, don’t you?” he more said than asked, far too smug.

She rolled her eyes, but couldn’t help the smile that tugged at her lips.

Several minutes of peaceful silence later, Alice asked, “What’s wrong?”

“Wrong?”

“Yes.”

“What makes you think something’s wrong?”

“I may not be an empath, but I think I’ve got a good read on you by now,” Alice said with exasperation. She flung out an arm to tap his ankles, and the constant twitching of his feet stopped. “You don’t fidget —not unless we’re around other people and you need to ‘play human’— but you’ve been restless all morning. So what’s wrong?”

Jasper sighed. “Well, the family has been talking.”

“What about?”

“After finding out you weren’t a hundred percent human yourself, they’re a lot less wary of you. They’ve talked it over, we took it to a vote, and it was decided that so long as you promise to keep the secret, I can tell you. What we are, I mean to say.”

“Oh!” She looked up at him with wide eyes, then smiled. “Okay then. Let’s hear it.”

But Jasper hesitated. “Maybe … you’d prefer to be sitting up for this?”

Her eyes narrowed. It’s like he thought she’d not want to be so close to him after she heard. Remembering Esme’s initial hesitance with her, Alice wondered if that wasn’t exactly it. And so her will turned resolute as she said, “No. I’m staying right here.”

Jasper gave her a surprised, then resigned look. “If you’re sure.”

“I am.”

“You mightn’t be comfortable with that position after you learn what I am.”

“Not. _Moving_. Japer.”

He sighed and ran a hand through his chin-length hair. “Alright. Okay. The first thing you should probably know, so you don’t freak out, is that my family are different from most of our kind. We’re … well, we say vegetarian, but we eat meat. Or _from_ meat. Animals that is. Only animals though.”

Alice nodded. She grabbed his other hand, which had taken to tearing at the grass, and tugged it to herself, cradling it close. Jasper let out a slow breath.

“There’s no delicate way to put this, so I’ll just come out and say it: we’re vampires.”

There was a long silence. Then, “Okay,” Alice said.

Jasper froze, staring at her in disbelief. “ _Okay_?”

“Okay,” she repeated, nodding, and squeezed his hand in hers.

“You’re…” He cocked his head to one side, looking at her in fascination. “…not the least bit afraid. Or frightened.”

“Nope.”

“How? Why?”

Alice shrugged. “I’d kind of guessed? I mean, I wasn’t absolutely sure, but a lot of it added up: pale skin, aversion to human food, strength and reflexes, increased senses, the fact that I never see you on the rare sunny days, only when it’s cloudy out… The time you mentioned being surprised my pulse wasn’t tempting was a big giveaway too,” she added wryly. “Plus, remember, I come from a place where there are wizards and magic and other non-human races.”

“There were vampires in your world too?”

She nodded. “Yeah. A bit different from your kind though, I’m thinking. You’re a _lot_ faster than the ones from back in my world. Stronger too maybe,” she added, eying him speculatively. She tapped her fingers against the back of his granite-like hand. “I mean, I’m just guessing, but I don’t think your skin is this hard without a good reason.”

“We _are_ incredibly strong,” Jasper said, sounding a bit stunned still. “And I don’t know about your kind of vampires, but we don’t burn up in the sun like the legends say.”

“Oh? That’s news.”

“Yeah, we… Well, there’s a reaction between direct sunlight and the makeup of our skin that causes a refraction of light. It makes it impossible to walk among humans without giving our inhuman nature away.”

“Refraction of light? Meaning?”

“We … sparkle,” he admitted reluctantly.

Alice stared for a long moment.

Then she burst into giggles.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry!” she said trying to calm herself, because Jasper looked embarrassed and a bit put out. “I just didn’t expect that.”

“Yeah, well, let’s not talk about it.”

She giggled again.

Jasper took a deep breath. “So you’re really okay with us being vampires?”

“Yeah. Really okay.”

He closed his eyes. “That’s good. The others will be pleased. Especially Esme, she really liked you. And Carlisle thinks you and your story are fascinating.” He opened his eyes again, and gave her a pained look. “But there’s more. It isn’t about the others though, just me. It’s about my past and … you probably won’t be so okay with the vampire, on my part, thing once you hear it. You won’t be okay with it at all.”

Brow furrowed, Alice said, “Let me be the judge of that.”

“Right. Okay. I guess it all started it Texas…”

* * *

Alice appeared in front of the Cullen house with a sharp crack of apparition and then stormed up to the front door. It opened before she reached it to reveal a bewildered Emmett.

“How’d you get here? We didn’t hear you coming up the drive, but I swear I heard a car backfiring.”

Alice huffed. “Not now Emmett. Where is Jasper?”

“Ah.” Emmett scratched the back of his head. “Well, um…”

Rosalie appeared then, shooing him off, and he left quickly and gratefully. She set her hands on her hips and gave Alice a sharp-eyed look. “I heard Jasper told you about his past.”

“He did,” Alice said curtly.

“If you break his heart,” the blond hissed, leaning close, “I’ll break _you_.”

“ _Rose_! You will do no such thing!” Esme scolded and tugged the blonde away. “Come on inside Alice. He’s in his room. He hasn’t stopped pacing since yesterday—I’ll have to replace his carpet, he’ll have worn it right through,” she tried to joke, but her smile was anxious and it was obvious she too was worried about Alice’s reaction.

Alice’s scowl softened a bit at the motherly vampire’s concern, only to harden when she looked over Esme’s shoulder and spotted Jasper descending the stairs, hands shoved into his pockets and not quite meeting her gaze.

“You,” she said, storming over. She shoved a finger at his chest so hard it hurt. “What were you _thinking_?”

Jasper winced. “I’m sorry,” he murmured. “I understand if you’d like me to stay away from now on.”

“You understand nothing! You staying away _is_ the problem. No, you _running away_ is the problem.” She huffed and crossed her arms to glare at him. “What were you thinking? You tell me all that about your past, only to disappear before I can say anything? How is that logical?”

“I…” He looked around at his family, who were watching the scene avidly but offered no advice. “I thought you’d want some time and space to think things over.”

“So you said. Before _running away_!” Alice threw her hands up in frustration, and then, to her annoyance, felt the prickle of tears. “You’re _such_ an idiot.”

Jasper’s eyes went wide and he took an aborted step towards her. “Don’t cry. _Please_ don’t cry.”

“I’m not crying. You’re just _stupid_.” And then she gave a wet laugh and threw her arms around his neck.

Jasper froze at first. But then, ever so slowly, he wrapped his arms around her waist in return, holding her lightly, like he was afraid she might break.

“So stupid,” Alice repeated. “Did you really think I’d want nothing to do with you? You’re an empath, for Merlin’s sake. Isn’t it blatantly obvious that I’m _more than a little_ attached to you?”

“Well, in my defence, you were reading an emotional blank after my story.”

“It’s called shock, doofus.”

Emmett snickered in the background. They ignored him.

“Shock which could’ve turned to horror and disgust any moment, which I … really didn’t want of feel from you. I didn’t want to feel you hating me,” Jasper admitted quietly, rocking them slightly in place as she sniffled. “I guess that was a bit cowardly of me. Sorry darlin’.”

“I forgive your cowardice. I don’t forgive your stupidity. Hate you? Really?” Alice’s scoff was, she felt, pretty eloquent in conveying her disdain at the very idea. “I mean, I’m not _delighted_ by your past.”

He stiffened. “No. Of course not. No one decent would be.”

“Yeah, and I can’t say I forgive you either.” He tensed further, so she let herself run a gentle hand up the back of his neck and into his hair. Softly, she said, “But that’s because it’s not my place to. If I could, I would.”

Jasper let out a harsh breath. “Don’t deserve forgiveness for those days.”

“Maybe not. Probably not,” she admitted. “But … I spent a lot of my youth being heroically, sickeningly selfless. A regular martyr. Almost literally, one time. This, you … I want to be selfish for once. I’m _going_ to be selfish for once. So I don’t care about your dark past, except that it haunts you. I don’t hate you, I’m not disgusted by you, in fact I kind of lo—” She cut herself off, eyes wide.

The room seemed to freeze.

Jasper slowly pulled back to look at her flushed face and her wide eyes. “You what?” he asked in a hushed whisper.

Alice reminded herself she was a Gryffindor as she swallowed hard and made herself meet his gaze. “I … well, I’m pretty sure I love you,” she admitted, chin raised defiantly. “But shouldn’t you know that already, Mr Empath?”

Jasper’s smile was like the sun coming out. She’d never _seen_ him look so full of joy. “Feelings’re all well and good,” he explained, “but sometimes things have to be _said_ to have their real impact.” He leaned down and rested his forehead against hers. “I love you too, you know.” And then he projected, letting her _feel_ the truth of it.

“Oh,” Alice said faintly, eyes fluttering closed at the strength of his heart. “That’s … good.”

“Good?” he echoed with a chuckle.

“ _Good_ ,” she said again, more firmly.

Right about then would have been the perfect time for a love-affirming kiss. Maybe even … _more_ than just a kiss? Jasper looked to feel the same as his eyes darkened and his head tilted just slightly—

There was a stifled sob.

Both froze, lips a hair’s breadth apart, suddenly remembering their audience. They turned to see that it was Esme, eyes shining with unfallen tears and a hand over her mouth, who had made the noise. She was staring at them with as much pride and joy as any human mother whose child had found love would feel.

“I’m so sorry,” Esme choked out, apologetic. “I didn’t mean to interrupt the moment, but I just…”

Carlisle had his arms wrapped around the woman, smiling softly. Emmett’s grin was broad and pleased, while Rose, at his side, had actually relaxed her usual icy front enough to smile.

“Is she Alice?” a voice asked quietly.

Alice looked over and realised that Edward and a human girl had entered at some point. Or maybe they’d been there all along, and she’d been too distracted to notice?

The girl blushed red at the sudden attention on her, embarrassed that her question had rung so loud and clear in the quiet room. She’d obviously only meant Edward to hear it.

“I don’t think you’ve met Bella yet,” Jasper said.

“No, I haven’t.” Alice gave the girl a smile, but couldn’t bring herself to leave Jasper’s arms to greet her properly. “Nice to meet you.”

“You too,” Bella said with an awkward wave.

Alice looked around and realised she’d made a bit of a scene with all this. “So… Sorry about barging in like an angry harpy.”

Rosalie snorted. “It’s fine. Men are stupid at times. I understand your frustration.”

“Hey!” Emmett objected.

She gave him a flat look. “You bought yourself a PlayStation for my birthday.”

“It got that for _you_!”

“You know I’ve no interest in your silly little games.”

“They’re not silly!” He deflated at her withering glare. “I mean, I got you a diamond necklace too?”

“After I set the PlayStation on fire and threatened to confiscate your manhood for a month,” she said crisply, and Emmett winced at the memory, hands going protectively to his groin.

Alice was amused by the interaction between the couple. More than that though, she was anxious to get Jasper alone after their recent confessions. She caught his gaze and murmured, “Come back to mine so we can talk?”

Apparently whispering didn’t stand up to vampire-hearing because Emmett wolf-whistled. “ _Ooh_ , she wants to take you home with her. To ‘talk’.” He waggled his eyebrows.

Jasper ignored him. “Yeah, sure. Though, how _did_ you get here?”

“I told you about apparition, right?” He nodded and she asked, “Mind if I take us back the same way I came?”

He smirked. “Impatient?”

She kept her gaze even, but let him feel every ounce of love and lust she had for him.

Jasper’s eyes darkened and his arms tightened around her. “What I meant to say,” he hurriedly corrected, “was: no ma’am, I don’t mind at all.”

It was her turn to smirk, right before she apparated them out.

* * *

Alice saw how Jasper’s eyes widened at finding them suddenly in her living room, but he didn’t dwell on it. He clearly thought his first ever teleportation wasn’t anywhere near as important as capturing her mouth with his. Alice completely supported Jasper’s priorities and curled one leg over his hip, moaning when he cupped her arse under her skirt and pulled her closer.

“Bedroom,” she murmured against his lips.

“Are you sure?”

Alice just hitched herself up, other leg going around Jasper and crossing her ankles behind his back. She leaned back and grabbed the edges of her blouse then pulled it up and off, tossing it aside.

In a blur of motion they were in her bedroom where Jasper gently lowered her to the bed. Somewhere in the interim, he’d also lost his own shirt. He rested on his side next to her, running hands across her stomach and up to cup her breasts in their satin cups. He reached a hand behind her and unhooked her bra, throwing it aside.

“Fuck you’re beautiful,” Jasper said, looking so gratifyingly awed by the sight of her that he barely noticed as she reached for his jeans, undoing the button and tugging at the zip.

When his thumb began to brush over one of her nipples, Alice gave a soft, pleased, “Hmm,” echoed by a louder, “ _Oh_!” as a wet mouth closed over the other.

Her hands ran restlessly through Jasper’s hair as he shifted to rest between her parted thighs. He slowly traced up and down Alice’s legs, pushing her skirt up higher and higher while his mouth at her breasts continued to make her gasp. When he brushed a knuckle against her matching satin panties, she rocked into the sensation.

Alice folded her knees up high enough to hook her toes in the waistband of Jasper’s jeans and push them down. She licked her lips as she realised he wore nothing underneath, that there was only that cool, hard skin against her legs.

Jasper released her nipple with a wet pop, removing his jeans the rest of the way. He then knelt back to unzip and then tug off Alice’s skirt. She bit her lip and stared at him all the while, at his cock standing long and erect. Her panties were next and then he leaned over her, capturing her mouth again as one hand smoothed down her stomach, over her mound, and two fingers slid through her slit then pressed inside her.

“ _Jasper_ ,” Alice cried, back arching.

“Do you like that sweetheart?”

“Yes,” she gasped out as he worked his fingers in and out of her, bringing her nearer and nearer the edge … only to stop.

Alice moaned in frustration, but Jasper just chuckled and lowered himself onto her, pressed his hips to hers. And then he was there, thick and cool and hard, easing inside of her.

Alice remembered her hurried, awkward, slightly-painful first time with Neville before the Battle of Hogwarts, and the equally awkward —though thankfully painless— handful of times thereafter, before they realised they were much better off as simply friends. This was nothing like _any_ of those times. This was so much more, so much better.

Jasper twisted his hips and managed to hit just the right spot, making Alice cry out. Her nails tried to dig into his shoulder, but there was a sound like scraping stone, and she spared a very brief moment to lament that he wouldn’t carry her marks after this. But then Jasper sped his pace, targeting her sweet spot ruthlessly now that he’d found it, and soon all that could be heard was his low, constant growl and her own increasingly high-pitched cries.

“Jasper, Jasper please,” Alice begged, mouth searching blindly for his.

Jasper growled louder, biting her lower lip just shy of breaking skin, and sped up his thrusts. She came moments later with a breathless scream, and Jasper buried himself in her roughly one last time with a snarl, then froze and shuddered as he too found his release.

Minutes later they lay wrapped in one another’s arms, basking in the afterglow.

“That was… I’ve never…” Alice trailed off, eyes fluttering closed as her body twitched in another aftershock. “I’ve never come so hard in my _life_.”

Jasper chuckled. “Darlin’, you’re too good for my ego.” He bent his head down to press a sensual, open-mouthed kiss behind her ear. “And anyway, you ain’t seen nothing yet.”

“Oh?” She raised a challenging eyebrow, amused at his smug confidence.

“You ever heard of a feedback loop?”

Alice’s eyes went wide. “You mean…?”

“You feel my pleasure, as I feel your pleasure, as you feel me feeling you, as I feel you feeling me…” His voice dropped to a husky growl. “And when we come, sweetheart, it’ll go on and on and _on_.” He smirked, all sex and promise. “My record’s just shy of half an hour. What say we see if we can’t break it, hmm?”

“ _Half an hour_?” Alice whimpered, because surely there were —or ought to be— limits to pleasure … right?

“Mhmm.”

She swallowed hard, torn between burning desire and apprehension.

Desire won out.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “What is _this_?” they gasp. ”An update _already_?”  
>  “Yes,” says I. “But just a short one.”
> 
> I’d also like to take a moment to apologise for the blatant abuse of ellipses in this story. I count 96 so far. Seriously. (Though I don’t know how well my apology stands up when I intent to continue with this overuse…)

It was late afternoon before Alice and Jasper dragged themselves out of bed and returned to the Cullen house. The family planned to go ‘camping’ for the weekend —a cover for their hunting trips— and neither Alice nor Jasper wanted to part until the last possible second, not after their new intimacy.

Mere moments after they apparated in however, Jasper hissed and clutched at his head, doubling over in pain. Before Alice could act he straightened up again, snapping his head towards where Edward sat by the piano with Bella, staring at Jasper with disapproval.

“Edward, what the fuck were you thinking?” Jasper growled at him.

“What was _I_ thinking? You’ve the worst control of any of us and you risked an innocent human’s life just to appease your base desires?” Edward sneered.

“You _know_ Alice doesn’t set off my bloodlust, and I’ve an excellent gauge of my own strength. Even were that not the case, you had _no right_ to go barging through my head to satisfy your curiosity!”

“What?” Something in Alice’s tone made the whole room freeze. It screamed ‘danger!’ to every one of their primal instincts. There was a sharp, almost soundless crackle like electricity in the air and the scent of ozone: her magic stirring in agitation. “Are you saying Edward not only purposefully forced himself past your mental barriers in order to violate your mind and privacy, but _also_ did so with the intent of seeing and judging our intimacy? Are you saying,” she repeated to Jasper as she slowly approached the frozen Edward, “that he now possesses stolen memories of us from last night? Of me naked? Of us _having sex_?”

“Yes,” Jasper growled, looking like he was holding back from attacking by the barest thread of self-control.

“I…” Edward looked around as if asking for help, but none of his family looked interested in jumping in. If anything they looked angry at him, or disappointed. Even Bella was staring at Edward with something other than the usual adoration, looking shocked and appalled. “I was worried. _Understandably_ worried it turns out. Jasper bruised you! I saw it. He—”

Alice whipped out her wand and pressed it to a wide-eyed Edward’s forehead. “Obliviate!” she hissed.

Edward gave a gasp as a jet of light hit him. He then blinked his eyes in dazed confusion, stumbling a few steps before he regained his balance.

Carlisle was by Edward’s side in an instant, checking him over worriedly like the doctor he was. Meanwhile, Rosalie had crossed the room and crouched in front of Edward, growling at Alice in a feral manner. Too fast for Alice to notice, Jasper had also moved to shield her, snarling at Rosalie to back off. This of course brought Emmett to his girlfriend’s defence, and he was telling Jasper to, “Calm down. Just calm down, and back off.”

“What did you _do_ to _my brother_?” Rosalie demanded, all protective fury. She shot a concerned glance over her shoulder to where Edward was.

Bella had raced over and was fretting too. Esme was watching the whole scene with wide, worried eyes, a hand covering her mouth.

Alice, meanwhile, had been shocked from her haze of righteous fury by the reactions. Not to say that she was suddenly okay with what Edward had done, because she really wasn’t. She huffed and pocketed her wand, then stepped out from behind Jasper, ignoring the way he tensed and placed a restraining hand out across her middle.

“I swear,” Rosalie said, “if your little magic trick harmed him, I’ll—”

“Not touch a hair on her head,” Jasper cut in darkly, “or I swear I’ll rip yours off.” He left it up to interpretation whether he meant Rosalie’s hair or her head.

“Come on guys, no need for threats,” Emmett said, trying to calm them down. Peacemaker was an unusual position for the normally boisterous and occasionally-tactless vampire, but Alice guessed he just loved his family and wasn’t comfortable with them _really_ fighting. “Jasper, you’re not touching my Rose. And Rose, let’s find out what she did first before we throw around threats, okay?”

“Edward?” Carlisle asked, holding up a hand. “I want you to follow my finger.”

“What?” Edward asked, sounding confused. “Carlisle, I’m not some concussed human.”

“Edward, just … please.”

“Fine. There. Happy?”

Carlisle sighed in relief. “All symptoms of disorientation seem to have disappeared.”

“So it was just a … er, disorientation _hex_ or something? Is that a thing?” Emmett’s voice was full of false cheer, still trying to diffuse the situation.

“He’ll be fine,” Alice promised, holding Rosalie’s gaze so the other woman would know she was being completely honest.

Rosalie seemed to understand, straightening from the threatening crouch she’d taken. Jasper relaxed a bit at that, which in turn caused Emmett to sigh in relief.

“What exactly did you do? Was it as Emmett hypothesised?” Carlisle asked. “I’ve rarely ever seen disorientation in a vampire. Our minds are usually so fast… And to lose one’s balance is unheard of!”

Alice explained, rather bluntly, “I erased those memories he stole from Jasper’s mind.”

As one the room gasped, several in shock, others in nervousness.

“You can _do_ that?” Emmett asked, wide-eyed.

“Yes,” Alice said simply. “I don’t like to, but under the circumstances…”

“What right did you have to do that?” Edward demanded, looking alarmed, one hand going to his head. His eyes flickered back and forth like he was trying and failing to recall something.

Alice just stared at him for a long moment. “I’m sorry Mr Mind-Rapist, can you repeat that? Only I couldn’t quite hear over the sound of your _utter hypocrisy_.” She shook her head. “You have no moral high ground here, you voyeuristic deviant.”

Emmett took that moment to burst into laughter. “Hah, she’s got you there, Eddie-boy.”

“I’m not a _voyeur_ ,” Edward said, whispering the world like it was scandalous. “I’m not a _deviant_.”

Rosalie smirked. “I don’t know Edward. They say actions speak louder than words.” She turned to give Alice a considering look. “Would you be willing to give me and my man some tips in the mind-blocking thing you’ve been teaching Jasper? We’re hardly platonic,” she said dryly, sliding a hand in Emmett’s back pocket to illustrate her point, “and I don’t want to give Edward any more voyeuristic opportunities than necessary.”

“I’m not a voyeur!” Edward repeated.

“I don’t understand.” The soft voice, laden with pain and confusion, made them all turn towards Bella. She stared between Alice and Jasper, then looked at Edward with wide, hurt eyes. “Vampires can’t be with humans _that way_. Right?” Her tone as she asked the question was almost pleading.

Rosalie scoffed. “Where’d you hear that bullshit?”

“Rosalie, language,” Esme chided.

“Well it is,” she huffed, tossing her hair over one shoulder and giving Bella a scornful look. “You ever heard of succubi?”

Bella’s cheeks flushed. “From the mythology?”

“Rosalie,” Edward growled.

Rosalie’s eyes widened with some realisation, but then, with a glint in her eye, she turned back to Bella and said, “Gorgeous demonic women who sleep with mortal men. The myths were based on our vampire cousins in Denali. Even _they_ have lost count of the number of humans they’ve slept with.”

“E-Edward?” Bella swallowed hard. “You always say we _can’t_. Is it just that … you don’t _want_ me … like that?”

“Bella, no, that’s not it,” he defended, stepping closer to her, but she stepped back, making him flinch. “It’s a completely different situation.”

“Oh, I see,” Emmett said. “Edward the prude not putting out for you Bella-bear?”

His words weren’t meant cruelly, but Emmett wasn’t the most emotionally sensitive of people. Bella’s eyes visibly welled with tears before she ducked her head, hiding behind her hair. Edward threw his brother a harsh glare.

“Normally I’d say this is no one else’s concern but Edward and Bella,” Carlisle said, a bit awkward, but mostly compassionate. “But Bella, Edward’s right. The situation with you is different.”

“How?” she asked in a quiet voice.

Esme stepped closer to the girl, wrapping a motherly arm around her. “You’re his Singer, dear. Your blood calls to him like no other.”

“I know, he explained that. But what does that have to do with it?”

“Our bloodthirst and self-control are inextricably linked,” Carlisle explained clinically. “A vampire mindless with bloodlust will, in turn, lack self-control. They will do things they’d normally never consider. And conversely, acts that require relinquishing some control, such as sexual intercourse, can have a tendency to make a vampire weak to their bloodlust as well.”

Softly, Esme explained, “You being Edward’s Singer makes him worry that he just wouldn’t have the control not to succumb to his desire for your blood if … otherwise distracted around you.”

Bella’s face was scarlet by now. “Oh, I, I see,” she stammered, avoiding everyone’s gazes.

“I’m sorry, love,” Edward said, taking her from Esme’s arms and into his own. “I wish I could give you everything you want from me. You deserve better, someone human who could give you—”

“No!” she shouted, wrapping her arms around him desperately. Softer, she repeated, “No. Edward, I don’t want anyone else. I just want you.”

Alice watched them lose themselves in one another’s eyes with some bemusement. Sure, she adored Jasper, and they had their tender moments, but she was rather glad that _their_ romance was less … dramatic. Less ‘Romeo and Juliet’, rife with obstacles and second-guessing. She and Jasper had just clicked from the first moment in a way she’d never imagined possible. They didn’t lack for passion, but underlying every moment was a warm comfortableness that she relished in.

Really, their relationship had progressed more smoothly than she could ever have hoped, given the propensity for drama and danger that highlighted Alice’s childhood. She was so glad to have left that behind. And she was really, _extremely_ glad —especially after last night— that there was nothing holding her and Jasper apart physically.

“What are you thinking?” Jasper drawled into her ear huskily.

Alice startled. “Oops?” she tried, realising Jasper had probably _felt_ exactly how her train of thought had wandered to their more pleasurable activities.

“Not fair, darlin’,” he muttered. “Unless you want me to whisk you away without warning, don’t tease me like that where I can’t take you up on the invitation.”

Alice bit her lip as she noticed some of the glances of the other vampires in the room. They’d no doubt heard, what with their unfair supernatural hearing.

“One thing I don’t understand,” Bella said. “I thought…” She paused and gave Alice’s other half a brief, apologetic glance. “I thought Jasper had the _least_ control over his bloodlust.”

“I do,” Jasper admitted. “Usually. But I’ve never been the slightest tempted by Alice’s blood. She doesn’t smell like ‘food’ to me.”

“What does she smell like?” Bella faltered. “I mean, if that’s not rude to ask? Edward says I smell like freesias.”

“You do have a floral scent to you,” Jasper agreed. “Freesia, or lavender or something. My Alice smells like oranges.”

“And it doesn’t tempt you _at all_?”

Jasper smirked then. “Oh, it tempts me _plenty_. Just not the way you mean.”

Emmett guffawed as Bella’s eyes went wide and her cheeks heated upon realising what Jasper was implying. Edward glared at Jasper for being crude and embarrassing Bella, but Jasper was unrepentant.

“Rose was the same with me,” Emmett said, giving Rosalie an admiring look. “Found me half mauled to death by a bear, bleeding everywhere, and managed to carry me _miles_ back to Carlisle to be changed. Didn’t take so much as a sip.”

Rosalie gave him a rare, soft look. “You smelled like Christmas: pine trees and baked apples. There was no temptation to feed on you. But that’s the way with true mates.”

Alice paused, something registering. She turned to look up at Jasper. “Mates?”

“Right. I forgot to mention that, didn’t I?” He rubbed the back of his neck, looking sheepish, but she could also see that he was nervous for some reason. He sensed her confusion and explained, “What you’ve told me about your past, being controlled, at the whim of fate…”

“Oh,” she gasped softly with understanding. She leaned up on tiptoe and pressed a kiss to the corner of his mouth. “You thought I’d resent it.”

“I knew you were ‘it’ for me from the moment I first heard your voice, before I even saw your face. Most beautiful sound I ever heard, darlin’, till you laughed a few moments later. And when turned and I saw you… I’d never _seen_ someone so gorgeous.”

“It was much the same for me. Your voice, your face, your presence —everything about you— was just so perfect, so comforting. So _right_.” She tilted her head. “You look surprised. Why?”

“Humans generally don’t recognise the mate bond the same way vampires do.”

“I’m more than merely human,” she reminded him. “And such connections are highly rare but not unheard of among my people. Honestly, I’m a bit embarrassed that I didn’t click to it myself.” She kissed him again, properly this time. “I can see why you worried about telling me. But you and me? I don’t care if fate _is_ meddling. I wouldn’t trade _us_ for anything.”

He kissed her back, firm and full of feeling, but chaste in consideration to their audience.

Well … _mostly_ chaste.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I aim for this to be a ‘no bashing fic’. Not that I don’t like a bit of bashing when I read and write, but I just don’t feel that for _this_ story. So despite what it seems like, Edward will somewhat redeem himself eventually. Actually, probably next chapter. I don’t plan to crucify him, or Bella … or anyone really.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’d been doing pretty well with weekly-ish updates until now. Unfortunately RL has been kicking my arse. That’s also my excuse for not replying to all reviews/comments for the last chapter, sorry. On the plus side though, this is the longest chapter yet! That sort of makes up for things … right?

The vampires left for their ‘camping trip’ shortly thereafter, leaving Alice and Bella standing awkwardly together outside the Cullen house.

“I’m sorry about what Edward did,” Bella blurted out, breaking the silence.

Alice raised an eyebrow. “Why are _you_ sorry? He’s the one who was out of line.”

“I know, just… He means well,” she said earnestly. Then, after a pause, Bella hiked a thumb at the tank masquerading as a truck behind her. “Um, do you need a lift?”

“No, it’s fine,” Alice assured her. “I can get back home the same way I came.”

“Oh. But…”

Alice cocked her head as the girl wrung her hands before shoving them in her jeans’ pockets. “What?”

“If you don’t _need_ a lift, maybe you’d _like_ one? We could hang out at my place. I could put a frozen pizza in the oven, and dad won’t be off work for hours yet and—” Bella’s babble cut off. “It’s just, I don’t really get to talk to others much about…” She waved a hand in a sort of all-encompassing gesture. “…the whole vampire thing, you know. Well, I say not much, I really mean _never_.”

Alice considered it. “Sure,” she decided. “I guess that would be okay.”

“Great!”

The noises the red-orange truck made didn’t do one whit to change Alice’s tank theory. It roared as it was started, then rumbled loudly as they headed off down the Cullens’ drive.

“So you’re a witch? I mean, Edward told me so yesterday.” She gave Alice a quick look. “Is it alright that he did?”

Alice grimaced but nodded. She wasn’t happy Edward hadn’t held his tongue until Alice gave him the official okay. But on the other hand, after apparating herself and Jasper away in front of Bella, Alice had pretty much given the secret away herself. Since Bella was already aware of the supernatural through Edward and his family, and had showed she could keep it secret, Alice supposed she didn’t mind _too much_.

“Have you always been one?” Bella asked, fascinated, as they reached the end of the drive and turned onto the road. “Or is it something you learned? Or a change you underwent, like becoming a vampire?”

Alice relaxed at the questions. Apparently Edward hadn’t spilled _all_ the beans, only enough to explain what Bella had seen. “I was born a witch, but I had training to refine my skills,” Alice explained. “What about you? How did you get involved in the supernatural?”

“Through Edward.”

“He wasn’t okay keeping it from you when you got together?” Alice guessed.

But Bella shook her head. “No, it wasn’t like that. I figured it out myself, actually, and we got together after that. I put the clues together.”

“Same as me then.” When Bella looked surprised, Alice shrugged. “Well, I was about ninety-five percent sure I had it figured out, but I let Jasper tell me at his own pace. What about Edward tipped you off?”

“A lot of things I noticed over time: the pale skin, his beauty, the speed and strength —he even saved me from getting crushed by a van once, stopped it with his bare hand— and then the fact the Cullens never ate, and were never around on sunny days. I knew there was something different about him right from the very beginning though. When I met Edward, he was just … really weird. Acted like I was the worst thing he’d ever smelled, tried to change classes to get away from me even. Then he disappeared for _months_ from school.” Bella grimaced. “I know now that it was because of my blood calling to him, but at the time…”

Alice remembered what it was to be a young, self-conscious teen. “Ouch?”

“Yeah, I took it personally. Especially since my first thought on first seeing him had been—” She flushed. “Well, that he was the most beautiful boy I’d ever seen.”

“I’d argue that Jasper holds that title,” Alice countered playfully, “but I think he’s more ‘ _man_ ’ than ‘boy’.”

Bella glanced over and away, biting back a smile. “Apparently,” she continued, “Edward had run all the way to Alaska to get his head sorted, and when he came back he laid low at home and had his siblings steal my clothes to acclimatize himself to my scent.”

Alice blinked. “That’s… I get the logic, but it’s still kinda creepy.”

“You don’t know the half of it,” Bella said with a fond yet exasperated eye roll. “Apparently his first idea was to sneak into my bedroom at night.”

“What, while you were _there_?” Alice asked, incredulous.

“Mhmm. Sleeping.”

“I see Edward’s stalking tendencies aren’t limited to me, then. Thankfully I had Jasper to put a stop to it.”

“For me too, actually. Jasper was the one to suggest clothes instead. Less risky, was his thought, I think. I’m glad, even if I _did_ spend a few very frustrating weeks wondering why my things kept disappearing then showing back up unexpectedly.” She bit her lip. “Glad … and maybe a bit disappointed too.”

Alice raised an eyebrow. “What, you _wanted_ a near-stranger to sneak into your room and watch you sleep?”

“No! No, of course not. Not _then_. But now I know him … sometimes I think it might be kinda nice. A chance to be alone with him in my bedroom.” Her tone, which had started off girlish and confiding, fell flat towards the end.

“Bella?”

“It’s nothing, just…”

“This is about the conversation earlier,” Alice realised. “About the, er, limited intimacy between you two?”

“Yeah.” Bella’s cheeks grew flushed. As they came to a stoplight, her fingers tapped an anxious beat on the steering wheel. She took a deep breath, gave Alice a sidelong glance, then asked, hushed, “What is it like, being with Jasper?” Then her eyes went wide. “Oh god, I can’t believe I asked that! I’m sorry, I—”

“It’s fine, Bella. I don’t mind if you’re curious. I mean, I’m not about to give you an explicit play-by-play, but…”

Alice gave the red-faced girl a considering look as the light turned green and the truck began moving again. Alice was feeling suddenly … older sister-ish? Bella was really very young. Or maybe, Alice reflected, she herself had just been forced to mature too fast, what with the Dursleys and fame and Voldemort and war. It made others seen childish in comparison.

How much of an age difference was there, really, between the two of them? It couldn’t be too much. Alice herself was just twenty-one.

“How old are you Bella?”

“What? I, it’s, I’m over the age of consent,” she stammered. “If that’s what you’re getting at.”

Alice smiled at her gently. “No, I was just curious.”

“Oh. I’m eighteen.” Bella’s voice was dejected and her shoulders slumped. “But I’ll be nineteen pretty soon. September thirteenth.”

“And this is not a happy thing?”

“…Edward was seventeen when he was changed,” she murmured.

Alice considered that as Bella pulled up in front of a two-storey house on a quiet street. She followed the girl inside and accepted the offered bottle of coke. For a moment Bella froze, and Alice grew concerned as she saw the look of fear in her eyes, but then she followed Bella’s gaze to a bowl on the counter.

_Oh_ , Alice thought sympathetically, _I see_.

Bella quickly snapped out of it and pretended nothing had happened. She pulled a pizza from the freezer, stuck it in the oven and set a timer. That done, the pair wandered over and settled down in the living room.

“You’re worried about getting too old for him,” Alice said, returning to the topic of Bella’s unhappiness at her upcoming birthday.

The girl flinched and ducked her head. “I love Edward. _So much_. I want to spend the rest of my life with him, but…” She gave a helpless laugh. “He loves me, wants to spend the rest of my life with me too, but not the rest of _his_. He doesn’t want forever with me.”

“What makes you say that?”

“He doesn’t want to change me.” Bella tore at the label of her coke bottle. “I’ve asked. Repeatedly. He refuses every time.”

“Ah.”

“He says he won’t ‘damn me’. He thinks he doesn’t have a _soul_ you see, that no vampires does, that they’re just monsters.” She gave Alice a teary-eyed look. “So I’m stuck. I can’t bear the thought of leaving him. But on the other hand, what will that mean for us?

“Sometimes I have these nightmares,” Bella continued with a shudder, “Me and Edward, we’re lying together in our little meadow like we always do. Then I’ll see my grandma, but when I try to talk to her I realise it isn’t her at all, it’s a mirror. That nightmare’s going to come true one day. Eventually I’ll be old and grey and decrepit, and he’ll still be young and beautiful. And we won’t be able to tell people that we’re in love, that we’re together, because they’ll think it’s sick and wrong.”

Alice reached out and grasped Bella’s free hand in hers, squeezing comfortingly. “Have you told him about this?” she asked quietly as Bella wiped her eyes.

“No, I couldn’t.”

“Bella, a good relationship _has_ to be built on communication and trust. You _need_ to be honest with him.”

“…But what if he _still_ says no?” Bella asked quietly. “What if he still won’t change me?”

Alice frowned. “I think … that’s not really up to him, is it?”

Bella looked startled. “What?”

“Well, not to come over all preachy, but it’s the whole ‘your body, your choice’ thing. I’m pretty sure that’s about sex and touching and the like, but it extends to this too. Edward doesn’t get to choose what you want to do with your body, not even if your choice is to become a vampire. His only say in the decision is in regards to his _own_ body rights. You can’t make him be the one to change you, any more than he can deny you the choice to be changed.”

Bella’s eyes were wide, like Alice was saying something paradigm shifting. “But, if he won’t change me,” the girl said, “then I _don’t_ have a choice. Right?”

“Edward isn’t the only vampire in the world you know,” Alice pointed out.

“The other Cullens. They wouldn’t go against Edward’s decision,” Bella said quietly, but her tone was thoughtful.

“You never know unless you ask. You could try giving them the same ‘your body, your choice’ speech I gave you. You’re Edward’s girlfriend, not his pet. He doesn’t speak for you, not even to his family. If he thinks otherwise, well, that’s controlling and abusive and not okay. Point _that_ out to stalker boy. I’m pretty sure it’d set him back on his heels, maybe make him rethink things at least a little.”

Bella’s eyes were bright, and Alice could almost _see_ the thoughts whirring through her mind. Just then the oven buzzed and the girl excused herself to fetch the pizza.

As they ate, Bella looked thoughtful. Finally she asked, “So what _was_ it like with Jasper?”

Alice laughed. “Amazing,” she confided, and settled in for some girl talk, and, she suspected, answering some questions Bella had about sex and intimacy. She knew Bella lived with her dad, and doubted the girl felt comfortable asking _him_ such things. Alice didn’t mind filling the big sisterly role for her.

* * *

At hearing a knock at the door, Alice paused in her work, face taking on a peculiar look.

“Just a minute!” she called up from the basement, where she kept all her magical paraphernalia hidden away from prying Muggle eyes. She set her work aside and headed upstairs, locking the basement door firmly behind her.

Who could _possibly_ be calling on her? She’d had a couple of neighbours stop by to welcome her to Forks and collect gossip when she first moved in, but that quickly petered out. Only Jasper stopped by nowadays, and Alice had made it clear he was perfectly welcome to come and go as he liked. Mi casa es su casa, and all that. Honestly, she’d like it if he _never_ left. Alice had even been thinking of working up the courage to ask if he’d like to move in.

Alice opened the door and was surprised by the identity of her caller. “Edward?” This was unexpected.

“Hi,” he said, looking uncomfortable, running a hand through his hair.

“Hi,” she returned, then shook her head. “What brings you by? Last time you came around you were hiding in the bushes.”

Edward winced and ducked his head at the reminder of his former stalking. “I’m sorry about that. I was just worried about your intentions to my family. I could have handled it more gracefully though.”

“I understand that, I suppose. And you stopped when asked.” Not to say it was okay, but he was Jasper’s brother, so Alice was willing to forgive and forget so long as he didn’t take up old habits again. The apology just now was a nice addition too.

“I stopped by because I wanted to talk to you about some things.”

“Hmm. Maybe you’d better come inside,” Alice decided, holding the door open.

“Thank you.”

She led him to the living room. “Have a seat. I’d offer you something to drink,” she said wryly, “but under the circumstances…”

To her surprise, Edward’s lips quirked. “Worried I might take it as an offer?” he joked.

Huh. Well, who knew the kid had a sense of humour under all his brooding and brattiness? Alice allowed a small laugh. “So, you wanted to talk?”

“Yes. Or, well, to apologise.” He took an unneeded deep breath and met her eyes squarely. “I am sincerely sorry for the violation of yours and Jasper’s privacy I committed the other day. After taking the time to cool down, I realised I had _no_ right to do what I did. I’ve apologised to Jasper for purposefully invading his mind. Now I’m apologising to you for the…” He cleared his throat. “…for the presumably intimate nature of the memories I witnessed.”

Alice’s breath whooshed out. She leaned back in her armchair to regard him with wide eyes, wondering if there was a catch. But no, she could see nothing but honestly in Edward’s gaze. Honesty and apology and little if any reluctance.

Well, this wasn’t what she expected. Her interactions with Edward had been far from positive, and she hadn’t really developed a good opinion of him. She certainly hadn’t anticipated him admitting he was in the wrong the other day and _apologising_ for it. And unlike the earlier apology for the stalking, this time he offered no excuses, no justification for his behaviour, just straight-out took responsibility and owned up to it. Alice couldn’t help but respect that.

Still, she did wonder… “Why did you do it?” Alice asked. “What made you so determined to invade our privacy regarding _that_? It can’t just have been that you were worried for _me_ , like you claimed. We hardly know each other. If anything you should have been worried for _Jasper_ , since he’s your brother and I’m still something of an unknown.” Unlike Jasper, the other Cullens didn’t know the full extent of her magic and how dangerous she could be, and she knew they realised it.

Edward ducked his head and looked away. “I may have been untruthful about my reasons,” he admitted.

“Oh?” She raised an eyebrow in a ‘no, _really_ ’ sort of expression.

“Perhaps not untruthful, so much as … projecting.”

Alice tilted her head. That was interesting. “Projecting what?”

Edward grimaced and ran a hand through his hair. “Jasper is the only other in the family who has had a relationship with a human.” He paused, correcting, “Or a human-like being.”

“I’m still human, just with a bit more,” Alice said, but then her eyes went wide with realisation. “ _Oh_. This is about you and Bella. You have concerns about where your intimate relationship is going. Where it can and can’t go, rather.”

“I, well, yes,” he admitted, looking supremely awkward as he shifted in his seat. Apparently talking about such things was uncomfortable for him.

“So were you hoping to find an answer to yours and Bella’s problem?” Alice wondered aloud. “Or was it resentment that Jasper and I have what seems out of reach for you two?”

“…Both,” he admitted, after a moment of thought. He cleared his throat and straightened in his seat. “But this isn’t an appropriate topic of discussion,” he said firmly. “I just came to apologise for my poor behaviour, and promise it won’t happen again.

Yep, definitely not comfortable discussing sex. Still, Alice felt a bit bad for Bella. She considered the girl a friend now, so she decided to push the issue just a _bit_ more. “You know the saying ‘there’s more than one way to skin a cat’?”

“Yes, of course.” He gave her a perplexed look. “Why?”

“Bella and I had a girl’s evening while you and the family were off hunting,” Alice said, hiding a smile as Edward perked up in interest. For all his faults, it was clear he was as infatuated with Bella as Bella was with him. “I won’t explain any details, because I’m pretty sure that goes against the girl code, but … well, you’re not the only one with the concerns we just now mentioned.”

Edward looked pained and dropped his gaze to stare at his hands. “I wish…” He sighed. “I wish I could give her everything she wants.”

“You _are_ everything she wants,” Alice said. She gave him a narrow-eyed, suspicious look. “You strike me as the sort to do something stupid ‘for her own good’. Don’t _be_ that disrespectful arsehole, Edward.”

“What?” He looked offended.

“You heard me. I like Bella. She’s a sweet girl.” She really was. Though Alice was of the opinion she could use a bit more in the way of backbone. “If you even think of … I don’t know, breaking up with her; or trying to set her up with a ‘nice, normal, human’; or leaving her—” Alice’s jaw clenched at the slight, almost-unnoticeable flinch Edward gave at the latter. “If you try pull any of that bullshit, ‘for her own good’?” Alice paused, thoughtful. She nodded. “I’ll curse you bald and flatulent. Oh, and Jasper tells me you adore music, so let’s add tone-deafness to that list.”

She wondered if Edward realised how horrified his expression had turned, or the fact that he was leaning so far back on the sofa —as if to put distance between them— that the furniture groaned in protest.

“You wouldn’t,” he tried to say, but utterly lacked confidence. “Oh god, you _would_ wouldn’t you? Does Jasper _know_ he’s in love with such a devious witch?”

Alice put on a show of preening. “Why thank you for the compliment. And yes, yes he does. And he adores me for it.”

Meanwhile, Alice was hiding her smile of triumph. She may not be an empath, but she _had_ seen the way Edward had relaxed, like her threat was exactly the excuse he needed to abort any bullshit plans he had been considering. Good. If he left Bella, she _would_ have gone through with her threat.

“There was one other thing that came up with Bella,” Alice said. “Or, rather pointedly, _didn’t_ come up. But the way she kept flinching from the fruit bowl was rather telling.”

Perplexed, Edward asked, “Fruit bowl?”

“There were apples and _oranges_ in it,” Alice said. When Edward still didn’t get it, she sighed. “I think she’s so worried that —unlike with the sex thing— she can’t even fathom _broaching_ the topic, that’s how terrified she is about what the truth might be. But Bella’s not an idiot.”

“Of course not!”

“Yeah, so she didn’t miss the conversation about true mates and their scents … and the implications of her scent to you.”

Edward’s expression was stricken. “That’s not—” He shook his head. “I love Bella. I can’t imagine anyone more perfect for me. She _is_ my mate.”

“She is?” Alice asked, curious. She didn’t know a lot about the topic. “Does Singer trump mate scents or something?”

“No, but … a mate and a _true mate_ are different things,” Edward explained. “And true mates are exceedingly rare. One in a million. The fact that our coven has _two_ such matches is literally _unheard-of_.”

“Two? Me and Jasper. Rosalie and Emmet. So then … Esme and Carlisle aren’t true mates?”

“No. But no one can deny they’re completely in love and perfect for each other. They’re still _mates_.”

“What’s the difference?”

“True mates have an instant connection. Their voice, their scent, their face, their touch, everything about them attracts and soothes. For most vampires though, finding a mate is slower. Feelings develop over time, tying them together gradually until one day, something just … clicks into place and they know they’re mates.” Edward’s voice was soft, almost awed, and there was a little smile on his face. “That’s how it was for me with Bella.”

“I see. What if you one day find your _true_ mate though? What happens to Bella then?” It was a valid concern, and no doubt the source of Bella’s worries, Alice felt.

But Edward shook his head. “Ours was a choice, rather than fate, but it’s just as binding. There has never been a record of mates formed this way breaking apart because one found a true mate later.”

“Never?”

“Not once in all of the world’s history.”

Alice was relieved to hear that, for Bella’s sake. In fact… “I think you need to explain all this to Bella.”

Edward actually looked hesitant of all things. “If the topic is as painful for her as you believe,” he said, “then maybe it’s best not to bring it up, to let it be forgotten instead.”

Alice resisted the urge to bury her face in her hands. Merlin, did the boy before her ever have his stupid moments! Also? Those two _really_ needed to work on their communication and openness. “No,” she said bluntly. “Look, she’ll feel a lot better once she knows the facts. If you don’t explain, it’s going to fester, and _then_ Bella will suffer for it.”

With that, at least, Edward finally conceded. After a few long moments, he asked, “What did you mean by ‘disrespectful’?” He sounded a bit offended, but like he was trying not to be.

“Hmm?”

“You said I should not be that ‘disrespectful arsehole’.” He winced at the language as he said it.

Alice stared. “Really? You don’t see it? Edward, controlling and making decisions for a girl you profess to love, like she isn’t a thinking feeling being with her own opinions and a right to them, is just…” She grimaced. “Disrespectful is the only word for it really. Bella seems to think you’re some sort of gentleman, but the way you treat her makes me personally have my doubts.”

Edward looked a surprised, but also a little thoughtful. “I see. I’ll … think on that.”

“Please do,” she said. Bella would certainly benefit from it.

“I’d better get going,” Edward decided, standing. “Thank you for your time, and hearing my apology out.”

“Of course.” As she opened the front door to let him out, Edward paused.

“What were you going to say about skinning cats before?” he asked.

Alice’s eyes brightened. “Oh right, I got side-tracked.” She smirked at him. “If you’re worried about the things Bella is missing out on in her relationship with you, maybe you should consider that … well, just like there’s more than one way to skin a cat, there’s more than one way to give her the intimacy she wants. Just because _you_ can’t lose control, doesn’t mean you can’t make _her_ lose it. Maybe you and Bella could explore those possibilities. Intercourse isn’t the be-all and end-all of sex.”

Alice’s smirk had widened as she spoke, watching Edward’s expressions cycle from blank incomprehension to dawning realisation, and then to acute embarrassment.

After a stiff, if slightly flustered goodbye, Edward disappeared between one blink and the next, obviously eager to be away from the source of his discomfort.

Alice closed the door, turned around, leaned back against it and then burst into giggles.

If Edward ended up taking her advice to heart, Alice reflected, then Bella would _so_ owe her a thank you card. At the very _least_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So when I started writing this, I didn’t feel like dealing with ‘will they won’t they’ bullshit. I wanted unrepentantly feel-good Alice/Jasper. Hence the ‘true mate’ idea. They just click, right from the start, a natural attraction and trust. But of course that made me think about Edward and Bella. If this ‘true mate’ concept existed, then the pair of them, with all their drama and issues, couldn’t possibly be ‘true mates’. The scent idea underlines that point. So I decided that a true mate is exceedingly rare, and not the be-all end-all of romance. As proof of that I also made Carlisle and Esme mates, but not _true_ mates, a couple who are happy and perfect together even without that touch of destiny.
> 
> Also … as I mentioned last chapter, I enjoy reading good old-fashioned bashing, but that’s not where I wanted this fic to go, mainly because I think someone _really_ needed to give canon-Bella a ‘body autonomy’ talk and a ‘controlling behaviour is abusive’ one as well. Having Alice as Bella’s new friend/big sister figure gave me the opportunity to do just that. It was something of a revelation for Bella.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You know, I didn’t even notice, till people started commenting in their reviews, that there was no Jasper last chapter. What a terrible oversight! So this chapter, there’s again some Bella at the start, but then the rest is all Alice/Jaspery, and sexy at one part to boot. Enjoy!

Bella had put her foot down when Edward wanted to make a production of her birthday. Judging by the surprised looks it garnered from the other Cullens, Alice guessed that the assertiveness was a new thing.

Bella later confirmed that last year she’d let Edward railroad her into a date at a fancy restaurant for her birthday. Edward had worn a tux, and bought her an expensive dress and jewellery, and even hired a _limousine_. While some might find all that romantic, it had only made the frugal, introverted girl feel awkward and self-conscious.

Alice had felt a moment of pride in Bella for standing up for herself this time. And in herself too, she supposed, since it seemed Alice’s talk with the girl had made all the difference.

Instead of a fuss, Bella wanted to keep it low key. She wanted to spend the morning with her dad until he had to go in to work, then have him drop her off at the Cullens’ place on the way for a short, simple exchange of birthday greetings … and a grudging acceptance of the gifts they’d no doubt press on her. The majority of day she wanted to spend with Edward, just the two of them alone, till later in the evening. Then she wanted a girl’s night out at the movies to end the day.

And Bella had gotten exactly what she wanted. A good thing too, because the low-key celebration seemed to prevent her from becoming too stressed out in general, and about the ‘getting older’ thing in particular.

“So, how’s school?” Alice asked, twirling a fry absentmindedly and reluctantly taking a bite. “I can’t say it’s something I miss. My school days were … stressful.”

Alice had been invited to the movies along with Bella’s closest non-vampire friend at school: Angela Weber. The girl was sweetness personified, with just enough sass to give character. Alice liked her.

The film had been funny, and afterwards they had stopped by a fast food restaurant for a shamelessly unhealthy dinner before they would head home. They chatted about the movie until the subject ran out of steam, and were now jumping around other topics.

“Graduation’s just around the corner,” Angela said. She paused to sip her strawberry shake. “I’ve started applying for colleges already. I’m hoping to get into a good arts program. I want to go into photography. What about you Bella?”

“Me? I’m not sure to be honest,” Bella admitted. “I think maybe I’d like to be a writer.”

“Oh?” Alice said. “What sort? Journalist, novelist, poet … blogger?”

“Novelist,” Bella said firmly, then faltered. “Except it’s sort of like the nerdy version of those girls who want to be actresses, isn’t it?”

“Jessica wants to be an actress I think,” Angela said. There was nothing derisive in the comment, it was a simple observation. “She _is_ very pretty.”

“Hmm.” Bella was obviously a bit more sceptical about this Jessica’s chances, but didn’t say so aloud. “Still, maybe I should go for something more reliable than writing.” She shrugged glancing away. “I was thinking I might take a gap year, so I’ve got time to figure it out.”

There was … _something_ about the expression on Bella’s face at that last comment that made Alice wonder. Like a hidden double-meaning. Before she could ask, Bella was speaking again.

“Though, speaking of Jessica…” Bella turned to Alice with a faintly apologetic, but mostly amused look. “I’m afraid I made the mistake of mentioning, within her earshot, that Jasper moved in with you.”

Alice felt a bubble of warmth at the reminder.

She’d finally gathered the nerve to suggest it a few days ago, and Jasper had quickly put said nerves to rest by kissing her senseless and declaring that he would love to. He’d officially moved in yesterday, and just this morning Alice had discovered that there was something _particularly_ satisfying about waking up in Jasper’s arms.

“Jess _is_ pretty disappointed,” Angela agreed with a wince. “You might want to avoid her for a bit.”

“That should be easy enough. I don’t even know who she is.”

“Jasper’s number one fan,” Bella piped up, causing Alice’s eyebrows to shoot up. “Well, and Edward’s. But once he started dating me, she moved her attentions to the last single Cullen guy.”

“Whitlock,” Alice corrected.

Edward and Emmett went by ‘Cullen’ and feigned being the adopted children of Carlisle and Esme. Rosalie and Jasper’s cover was that they were Carlisle’s orphaned niece and nephew, and half-siblings with different fathers, because neither had been willing to give up their surname: Hale and Whitlock.

But back to this Jessica’s interest in Alice’s man… “He’s the school counsellor. Surely she knew he’d never do anything. It’d be completely unethical.”

“Jessica’s an optimist,” Angela said as she finished her shake and eyed Alice’s mostly-untouched fries. “Are you sure?” she asked when Alice pushed them towards her.

“I’m more of a chips girl. Proper chips, not these anorexic french-fry things.” Alice reached for her chicken nuggets instead, watching bemusedly as Angela dug into the fries, wondering how the girl kept such a lithe figure if she always ate so enthusiastically.

“Thanks. Anyway, you can’t blame Jessica for hoping. Jasper _is_ pretty gorgeous. What?” Angela asked with a laugh at the two ‘oh, _really_ ’ looks she got. “Just because I’m with Eric, that doesn’t make me _blind_.”

Alice grinned. “Yeah, Jasper’s drool-worthy,” she said, smug, because said drool-worthiness was all hers.

“Well, Jessica’s heartbroken,” Bella said finishing her own fries and turning her attention to her coke.

“Maybe someone finally needs to give Mike a hint?” Angela said thoughtfully. “Those two would be cute together.”

“Jessica _has_ liked him for ages,” Bella agreed.

“And he’s finally given up on you.”

“What’s this?” Alice asked as Bella flushed.

“Mike had a … thing … for me,” Bella admitted.

“He was persistent, you’ve got to give him that,” Angela said. “No one could call him flaky in his affections.”

“A bit _too_ persistent. But he finally seems to get that me and Edward aren’t a temporary thing, and I’m really not interested.”

“Speaking of Edward,” Alice said with a sly look. “Would he have anything to do with your state when I picked you up this afternoon?”

Angela looked extremely interested as Bella flushed again, this time turning tomato red. “What’s this?”

“She was _home alone with Edward_ when I arrived,” Alice confided with a grin as Bella, unbelievably, turned redder still. Alice hadn’t thought it possible. “She came out with this dazed look in her eyes and a goofy smile on her face. Edward just sort of … lounged in the doorway, looking part-smug, part-awkward.”

Angela gave a quiet squeal. “ _Bella_! Really?”

“I, that, it’s not like you’re thinking,” Bella stuttered out. She looked around, embarrassed, making sure no one was listening in. She leaned forward and admitted in a hushed whisper that, “Our relationship _has_ gotten more … _more_ lately.” She ducked her head, but couldn’t quite hide her pleased smile. “I mean, we haven’t done _that_ —I’m still a virgin— but we’ve done … stuff.”

“Stuff?” Angela teased gently.

Bella giggled. “ _Stuff_.”

Alice bit into a nugget with satisfaction. _Yep_ , she thought to herself, _Bella definitely owes me that thank you card_.

Shortly after that, Angela excused herself. “Just got to visit the ladies’.”

As the girl wandered past a group of rather buff, brown-skinned boys ordering at the counter, one of them caught her eye, gaped and tripped over his feet. Angela’s eyebrow rose before she covered a smile and continued on, even as the boy kept staring, his companions looking between surprised and delighted at their friend’s reaction.

Alice was briefly sympathetic for the poor boy and his crush. Angela struck her as the faithful type. So long as she was with Eric, the boy had no chance. Worse, his friends looked more than up to the task of teasing the shit out of him for his love-struck moment.

Then something else occurred to her, light a lightning bolt of realisation, and Alice sucked in a sharp breath as she turned back towards Bella. “A _gap year_?” she whispered fiercely, leaning towards the other girl who looked a bit like a deer caught in the headlights.

“What?” Bella tried to feign ignorance.

Alice gave a knowing look in return. “I take it you have … _plans_?”

Bella fiddled with her straw, but then took a deep breath and nodded. “I’m gonna ask Carlisle if he’ll change me,” she said quietly.

There was a crash of a food tray being knocked to the floor, and Alice looked past Bella to see the group of boys, now squished into one of booths with their meals, hurriedly trying to clean it up. Apparently their rowdiness had gotten out of hand. Or maybe Angela’s fan had noticed her reappearance from the bathroom and done his own version of Ginny’s ‘elbow in the butter dish’.

As Angela sat back down, Alice and Bella changed the topic, since they could hardly talk about a vampiric change in front of the other girl.

Meanwhile, Alice mentally wished Bella the best of luck, and hoped that Carlisle would hear Bella out and not automatically side with Edward, as Bella had feared. Though she also hoped Carlisle, if he was willing, would insist on talking it out with Bella first. Alice rather got the impression that the girl was less than fully informed on what it meant to become a vampire, because it was a topic Edward zealously avoided around her.

* * *

“Everyone’s at least a _little bit_ ticklish,” Alice insisted as they lay together in her garden. _Their_ garden now, really. The scent of roses drifted over them on the evening air.

“Not me,” Jasper said.

Alice frowned. She wasn’t even sure how the topic had come up, but now she was determined to win the argument. Her fingers slipped under Jasper’s shirt and danced across his ribs. He raised an unimpressed eyebrow, then smirked as Alice narrowed her eyes. She tried the small of his back next, then his neck, the soles of his feet, and finally the backs of his knees, pushing his jeans up so she could reach them. To all he gave no reaction.

“You keep this up darlin’, and we’re risking arrest for public indecency,” Jasper teased.

She huffed. “We rarely get visitors, and I’m certainly not expecting any at this time of night.” She pursed her lips and then an idea occurred to her.

“Don’t like that look in your eyes.”

“What look?” Alice asked, blinking innocently at him as she took her wand in hand.

Jasper’s gaze was wary, but still amused. “ _That_ look. The one that says you’re up to some sort of mischief.”

She pointed her wand at him playfully, and incanted, “Rictusempra.”

Jasper suddenly stiffened, eyes going wide. Alice watched gleefully as his jaw clenched, trying to hold back his reaction to the spell. Suddenly, though, his eyes gained a gleam that made her wary. In the next instant a veritable tsunami of emotion —of joy and hilarity— swept Alice under and she burst into laughter.

“I win,” Jasper said smugly as he pinned her underneath him in the soft grass, leaning down to peck her on the nose as he eased up on the empathy.

“Using powers is cheating,” Alice said, but her heart was warm and full of joy.

“You started it,” Jasper pointed out. Then he finally chuckled. But not because she’d won the argument—no, she’d lost her grip of the tickling charm when he unleashed his power. He was just laughing at _her_.

“Hmph.” She tried, and probably failed, to look put out. “I bet you cheat all the time too, don’t you _Mr Student Counsellor_?”

“It does give a certain advantage,” he admitted.

“It’s weird,” she said, absently trailing her hands up and down his arms. “You don’t strike me as a people person. I mean, you can be utterly charming when you want to be, even without your empathy, but you don’t exactly seek people out. A counsellor strikes me as _such_ a people person job. You told me you’re not a fan of it. If you hate it so much why do you do it?”

“Hate’s a strong word. It’s just… Being around masses of teenagers with their hormones and their drama blaring at my empathy is never fun.”

“So why?”

“Carlisle was the one that suggested it. I made it pretty clear when I joined the Cullen Coven that I wasn’t interested in playing high school student like the others did, and not just because I didn’t trust myself not to lose it, even with Edward keeping tabs on my thoughts. Carlisle said I should at least try to be around humans on occasion, to work on my control. We figured one-on-one was best. Fewer emotions overwhelming me, and…”

“And?” Noting the way he avoided her gaze, she suddenly realised. “In case you slipped, there would be no witnesses.” She wasn’t sure how to feel about that, or the fact that he probably _had_ slipped in the past.

Jasper winced and nodded.

“I see. And Carlisle suggested the counsellor thing?”

“I was a bit sceptical, but… When Carlisle found me I was a wreck, and that’s putting it kindly. I saw my empathy as a curse. I felt, and shared in, every bit of my victims’ suffering, their terror and devastation when they realised what was happening, that I was killing them. It was driving me mad. Carlisle prevented me doing something stupid to escape the pain.” He softly brushed through her hair when she tensed, cupping her head and pressing a chaste kiss to her lips.

“You were going to…” Alice couldn’t even say it. She wrapped her arms tightly around Jasper’s waist, tugging until he rested more of his weight on her, until she could feel him solid and heavy and present, and not lost to her.

“I was heading that way,” he admitted. “But Carlisle saved me, showed me another way to live.”

“Animals.”

“Animals,” he agreed. “They feel too, of course, but it’s … dulled, to my senses. Less visceral. It’s something I can easily live with.”

Alice exhaled sharply. “Thank Merlin for Carlisle then.” She cleared her throat. “So when did he suggest the counsellor avenue?”

“A while after I joined the coven, once I’d settled into the family. He said I needed to try seeing my ability as a gift instead of a curse, and that psychology might be something I’d excel at. I was sceptical at first. But I owed him so much, I figured I should at least give it a try. He was right that empathy’s real useful in that field. I can tell when a patient is lying about their pain, how much they’re suffering, if they’re getting desperate or hopeless… I never would’ve pegged myself as a therapist of all things, but I’m good at it.”

“Do you always work at schools?”

“No. I’ve worked all over. Sometimes I have a private practice, other times I join an established one. A few times I’ve been attached to a hospital. We left that for a few decades before trying it though, because all the wounded and bleeding were such a challenge to my control, even if I stayed clear of the emergency room. Even then, we arranged it so Carlisle was always working there at the same time, ready to bail me out if it was too much.”

“So how’d you end up working at a school?”

“There was really no call for a therapist in Forks, being as small as it is, so I was ‘away at college’ the first few years. Then Edward overheard a student at Forks High a while back having some pretty heavy thoughts. Suggested I ‘graduate’ and come to Forks, apply to the school. So I did, and they hired me on part-time.”

“Were you able to help them? The student Edward mentioned?”

“Yeah, darlin’. They’re doing real well.”

“I’m glad.” Alice didn’t even try to hide her feelings of pride in him, which made Jasper duck his head and look away.

He was sort of ridiculously adorable when he did that. Alice could tell Jasper she loved him and he would smile, soft but intense, and return the sentiment. And if she told him he was gorgeous, or the best she’d ever had, he just grew smug. But if Alice said or implied Jasper being an admirable person, having a good heart? It always took him by surprise, made him as close to bashful as he ever really got.

The reaction always made Alice wanted to kiss him, and this time was no different. And, well, since there was no reason to resist…

She leaned her head up and nipped carefully at his bottom lip.

That was another sort of sentiment that Jasper was always happy to return.

* * *

Alice frowned as she turned the teacup in her hands, staring at the dregs. She leaned back further, settling herself comfortably in Jasper’s arms.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, nuzzling her neck. “Did I not get it right?”

“No, that’s not it.”

Jasper had apparently been getting cooking lessons from Esme lately, and had awoken Alice with breakfast in bed that morning: perfectly crisp bacon, some sort of fancy scrambled eggs that were just delicious, marmalade toast, and tea made _exactly_ how she preferred.

It had been a delightful surprise. Alice appreciated the effort and thought that went into it, especially since she knew Jasper, like most vampires, found the scent of cooked meat and eggs _particularly_ repugnant. In fact… Alice absently cast an air-refreshing charm, and Jasper hummed, pleased.

“It was perfect,” she assured him fondly, turning her head to brush a kiss across his cheek. “Everything tasted great. Thank you.”

“Then why’re you giving that cup the evil eye? You feel annoyed.”

“It’s nothing, just…” She wrinkled her nose. “You vampires are terrible on my inner eye. Ever since we started spending so much time together, whenever I do a simple reading for anything noteworthy ahead, it’s all … blurry.”

“And that worries you.”

She shrugged. “Maybe. Sort of. I guess I’d gotten used to having that heads-up. I feel a bit … blind without it. Vulnerable.” Alice frowned, thinking. “I’m surprised I was able to See my way to you at all, actually.”

“Could it be the mate bond?”

“It’s possible, but I doubt it. I can’t See you now, so why would then have been different? If anything it should be the opposite. The bond didn’t really establish itself till we met.”

“Fair point. Do you have any other theories, darlin’?”

Alice nodded slowly. “Maybe it’s because I wasn’t searching for _you_ , not directly? I was searching for myself, for my happiness and fulfilment. I saw that it would happen for me here in Forks, in that diner. If I had been a bit broader in the scope of my divining, I probably would have seen that my happiness was also near a blind spot in my Sight. That blind spot would have been you.” Something about that theory niggled at the back of Alice’s mind.

“So what _did_ you see today?” Jasper asked, tucking his chin over her shoulder and looking down at the tealeaves. “Nothing at all, or…”

“Just a big blur,” she admitted. “Though if my theory is right, maybe focussing solely on myself would help?” She stared down into the previously incomprehensible cup, changing her target focus, and felt a smile spread wide across her lips as symbols and meanings suddenly became clear.

“You’re feeling triumphant.” Jasper’s arms around her waist tightened briefly in a congratulatory hug. “I take it that worked?”

“Yeah. It’s still not super clear, but there’s _something_ at least.” She turned the cup, viewing it from a different angle, and nodded her head. “A change is coming.”

“Good change or bad change?”

“Hmm, good. A change in my … connections, I guess?” She set the teacup down on the bedside table, then turned in Jasper’s arms, straddling his lap.

“Oh?” Jasper shifted back against the headboard and tugged Alice closer to him. He slipped his hands under her nightshirt, palms smoothing up the bare skin of her back. “What sort of connections?”

“People,” Alice said. She could feel Jasper growing hard where they were pressed together. She closed her eyes and began to rock and grind her hips against him as she tugged her nightshirt up and off. “Probably I’ll be meeting someone new. It’s a positive connection, so maybe a friend or a helpful acquaintance.”

Jasper’s hands fell to Alice’s hips. She arched her back, tilted her hips till—

Yes, just there.

Her clit was grinding against his hard cock _just right_ , only his boxers and her knickers separating them.

Suddenly Jasper lifted Alice up, pulling her tight against his chest. He tore his own underwear off, leaving him naked, in a move that thrilled Alice. She wished _her_ skin was strong enough that he could do the same, but if he tried he’d probably leave welts.

The smirk Jasper threw her way said he knew exactly what she was thinking, or more precisely _feeling_. Then he tugged the crotch her knickers to one side and released his grip on her waist, angling his cock just right so that it entered Alice as she slid slowly down his chest.

Alice threw her head back with a groan. Jasper leaned back, running his hands up and down her thighs as she began to rock, twisting her hips in figure eights, occasionally rising and falling as the desire struck her.

As Jasper’s hands explored higher up, traced around where they were joined, Alice’s movements grew faster and more desperate. She reached down and Jasper let her guide his hand where she most wanted it. He splayed his fingers across her hip while his thumb began to circle her clit, faster and faster until he was rubbing at an inhuman pace.

“Fuck,” Alice half-moaned, half-laughed. “Who,” she panted, “who needs a vibrator when you have a lover with vampire speed?” Her giggle was cut off by a choked sound as her body shuddered through an orgasm. Weakly, she pushed at Jasper’s hand. “Enough, enough. M’too sensitive.”

Jasper grinned and in a flash was sitting up, resting on his heels. Alice’s upper body fell back to lie on the bed, her spine arched as her lower half remained in Jasper’s lap. Judging by the hungry look in Jasper’s eyes as his gaze lingered on her chest, the position did _fantastic_ things for her breasts.

Feeling a bit playful, Alice stretched, arms above her head, arching further. Then she trailed her hands down her neck, her chest, and began to cup her breasts, lift them and squeeze them and generally put on a show. At the same time, with eyes heavy-lidded, Alice clenched down on the hard length inside her.

Jasper growled. He grabbed Alice’s hips and, in an arousing show of his strength, began to lift her off then pull her firmly back onto him, over and over, without the barest appearance of strain. He started slow, but quickly sped his pace.

The way Jasper moved her body, controlled their joining utterly, was strangely compelling to Alice. Sooner than she’d thought possible she felt her body begin to stir again, that string drawing tight once more. Her attentions to her breasts went from playful show to self-interested desire.

“Sweetheart,” Jasper groaned as his pace reached heights no human could hope to maintain, but he did it easily, and Alice whimpered and tugged at her nipples desperately. “Come on, come for me, just come.”

For a few brief seconds Jasper sped up to an inhuman pace that made Alice’s whole body vibrate. Her eyes rolled back and her toes curled as a wail of pleasure tore its way past her lips. Her body was sent into such violent release that she barely noticed as Jasper came, too busy jerking and shuddering in his grip.

“Shh, shh sweetheart,” Jasper murmured softly, huskily. He drew Alice up into his arms and ran soothing hands up and down her back as she clung to him, whimpering as each little movement sent new sparks off behind her eyes “You alright?” he asked, though surely he could feel how very alright —how very _amazing_ — she felt.

“Hmm,” Alice moaned, mouthing lazily at his collar bone. And then, because it _bore repeating_ , “Vibrators … _so_ don’t compare,” she managed to say.

Jasper burst into laughter.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Le gasp! Who could these new acquaintances be? Find out next time, on … Aurora!
> 
> (Was I the only one who got a Dragonball Z flashback while reading that last bit? Like, replace ‘Aurora’ with ‘Dragonball Z’ and… (Yeah, you know what? Maybe I shouldn’t have admitted I used to watch that. (Are you all _ashamed_ of me now? (I need to stop it with these nested brackets. (No, really.)))))
> 
> Ahem…
> 
> Imaginary cookies to anyone who guesses who is showing up next chapter!


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Only one person guessed who was coming this chapter. Just _one_! *insert sad face here*. Though I _was_ surprised at the number of people who said Sirius, since it was supposed to be a _new_ connection. But, well, now I feel guilty, because I suppose it was a difficult question, there weren’t any clues. So I feel the only thing to do is give imaginary cookies to _everyone_!
> 
> You’ll find out who the ‘new connections’ are as you read this chapter. But fyi, I took some liberties with their characters because … well, ’cause I can. Do I really need a reason? I took some references from book-canon, some from movie-canon, and a bit from fanon too. The rest I just made up. I’m sure you’ll all deal.

“Hey, how’d it go?” Alice asked as Jasper returned from the emergency family meeting that had called him away.

Jasper groaned as he swept her up and zoomed to the bedroom where he flopped backwards onto the bed. Alice levered herself up from where she was splayed across him to give an amused but questioning look.

“That good, huh?”

Jasper rubbed at his temples. “I didn’t know vampires could _get_ headaches, but I’ve been proved wrong.”

Alice frowned, concerned, and gently tugged his hands away to press a soft kiss to first one temple and then the other. She let her worry drift and focussed instead on calm and serenity and love. Alice knew she’d taken the right tact as Jasper gave a contented sigh and relaxed under her.

Relaxing herself as well, Alice curled into Jasper’s solid form, nosing the crook of his neck and inhaling the woodsy cinnamon scent of him. Jasper wrapped one arm around her waist while the other carded through her hair until she melted. If she was a vampire, Alice reflected, she’d be purring.

“So what happened?” Alice murmured.

“I’ve told you about the Quileutes, right?”

“The kinda-not-really werewolves?”

“Hmm.” Jasper twisted a strand of her hair around one finger. “Apparently when you and the girls went out for Bella’s birthday last week, a few of the Quileute boys were also out and about. They overheard some comment that made them think Bella intended to be changed.”

Alice frowned. “I think I know the comment they mean. But there was no one else in earshot when it was made.”

“The wolves have supernatural senses to go with their shifting. Earshot for them’s probably a bit farther than you’re thinking, darlin’.”

“Ah.” She remembered the table of muscled, native American-looking boys, and the knocked-over tray. Not an ‘elbow in the butterdish’ moment from Angela’s admirer after all. “Right.”

“It was a regular shit-storm of emotions.” Jasper winced just remembering. “Anger and rage and disgust from the wolves. A lot of shock from the family. Edward was lit up with horror and betrayal and denial, ’cause apparently he had no clue. Bella, she was shocked at first —apparently Edward hadn’t ever mentioned the wolves’ existence to her— and then when she realised the direction of the meeting she was all frustrated, heartbroken, desperate and a million other things. Emmet was excited at the idea of her as a sister, and annoyed at the wolves getting in the way. Rose was almost as horrified as Edward, for reasons that aren’t mine to share, and also healthily disgusted by the presence of the wolves. Esme was torn between love —she really wants Bella to join the family— and worry about the conflict and tension. Carlisle was the only one on an even keel, but combined with all the other million emotions bombarding me, it was just more fuel to the fire.”

“Sounds overwhelming.”

“ _Painfully_ so. Haven’t had to deal with that much emotional volatility since my days training newborns. Even then the emotions tended to be a little narrower in spectrum: anger, bloodlust and the occasional regular lust were about the limits of it. Maybe some confusion thrown in for good measure. Nothing as overwhelming as this morning.”

“So what happened?” Alice asked, worried but trying not to be, for the sake of Jasper’s calm.

Sensing her efforts, he her pressed a kiss to the top of her head and threaded both hands in her hair, tugging gently, affectionately. “Our treaty with them is basically that we don’t bite humans and we stay off their land, and in return they don’t attack us or reveal our vampiric nature to the humans.”

Alice’s heart clenched in sympathy. “Bella.”

“Yeah. Apparently she’s been meeting with Carlisle, almost talked him around to changing her even, all without Edward realising. ’Course, he does now, and chucked a right fit about it. The arse was pretty smug too that the treaty ruins their plans.”

Alice rolled her eyes. “That boy is such a _child_ sometimes.”

“I think maybe Carlisle changed him too early,” Jasper confided, making Alice snicker. “No, really. He’s stuck at the height of teen hormones and moodiness and dramatic angst. Just short of adult maturity. Eternally not-quite-a-man.”

“Peter Pan.”

“Hmm. To his credit, he _was_ heartily ashamed of his reaction when Bella started crying.”

“Oh, she didn’t,” Alice said sighed. “Poor thing.”

“Yeah. Of course that created a whole new storm of emotions to add to the mix.”

“Poor _you_.” Alice frowned in thought. “So, wait, if the treaty only says ‘no biting’ … can’t Carlisle just collect some of his venom and inject it with a needle instead?”

“Clever loophole,” Jasper complimented, fingers still tangling in Alice’s hair. “Unfortunately the wording of the treaty’s a bit … vague. It’s more like ‘no biting, hence no killing or turning humans’. It could be interpreted as ‘no biting to turn humans’. It could also be ‘no biting’ _and_ ‘no turning’, separate conditions.”

“Vague enough the wolves would feel justified in whatever stance they prefer to take,” Alice guessed.

“Right.”

Alice sighed. “So, that’s a pickle. What’s going to happen now?”

“For the time being, Bella’s change is officially on hold until we figure that out. We had to promise the wolves that much, because they were threatening war.”

“Shit. That sucks.” 

Then an unfamiliar voice spoke up from behind. “Now sweet thing,” it said, “ain’t no one ever told you not to talk about sucking around vampires? That and biting. It’s practically a dare.”

Alice’s head snapped up.

Red eyes, pale skin that shimmered in the light coming in the window…

It was a vampire.

A _human_ -drinking vampire.

A human-drinking vampire that had appeared in her _bedroom_ , out of _nowhere_ , and was possibly intending to make a _meal_ of her!

Alice’s heart skipped a beat then began to race. Before she could do more than reach for her wand however, there was a rush of wind and a second strange vampire appeared, a woman. She scowled at the man and smacked him up the back of the head. The impact made a sharp cracking noise and the man yelped.

“Serves you right, you idiot,” the woman snapped. “I leave you alone for two seconds to park the car and you barge right on in. What happened to knocking? Where are the manners your momma gave you?”

“I don’t even remember my momma!” the man objected.

“Then where are the manners I thought I’d beat in to you?” the woman quickly countered before giving Alice and Jasper and apologetic look. “Sorry about the idiot. We’ll just give you two a moment.” Then she grabbed the man’s ear, twisted till he howled, and dragged him from the bedroom.

“What … the … _hell_?” Alice turned a flabbergasted look on Jasper, who looked naught but exasperated.

“That was Peter and Charlotte.”

Alice’s eyes lit in recognition and she let out a gust of breath, slumping in abrupt relief. “Oh thank god! I thought… But what are they doing here?”

“Not sure. Guess we’d better get up and see.”

Jasper rolled off the bed to his feet and offered a hand to help her up. They headed for the door when something from the corner of her eye caught Alice’s attention. She glanced towards her dresser mirror and stopped, hand rising to trace the rather elegant twists and knots in her hair, realising that Jasper had been doing more than just playing with it as they lay together.

“When did you learn to braid?” Alice asked, delighted, as she grabbed a band from her dresser drawer to tie the ends off so it wouldn’t unravel.

Jasper’s gaze went distant and he frowned. “I’m not sure. I know I had younger sisters when I was human. Can’t remember them, but I’ve done my research. I think maybe … I learned for them?” His eyes focussed again as he looked upon her. “Like it, darlin’?”

“Love it.” She tilted her head this way and that to admire the full effect. She couldn’t believe her wild locks actually looked _tamed_. “You know, I was thinking of chopping my hair off, but—”

“Don’t,” Jasper blurted out.

Alice raised an eyebrow. “Oh?”

Jasper looked almost sheepish as he ducked his head. “You’d be beautiful either way,” he said softly, “but I like it long.”

The moment was ruined a sharp crack —no doubt caused once more by a stone-like hand impacting a stone-like head— and a cry of pain.

“What was that for, woman?” Peter’s loud voice demanded. Charlotte’s reply was too quiet for Alice to hear, but then Peter said, “But they _are_ sweet enough to rot your teeth!”

The comment was followed by another smack and Charlotte saying, “Ain’t got a romantic bone in your body!”

Cheeks a bit pink, Alice remembered their company and their heightened hearing. She also realised that, yes, she and Jasper _were_ a bit sweet sometimes. Jasper meanwhile rolled his eyes and rested a hand at the small of her back as he led them towards their guests.

“You’re an arse, Peter,” he commented as they entered the living room and took a seat on the couch opposite the other couple.

“Fuck you, I’m a delight. Ow, god dammit!” Peter cursed, rubbing his head. “What _now_?”

“Language, Peter,” Charlotte chided, lowering her hand. The whole interaction had been absentminded, like she’d done it so often she didn’t even need to think about it anymore.

Charlotte was tiny and sweet-faced, maybe even shorter than Alice, which was a feat in itself. Her honey-blonde locks were the exact same shade as Jasper’s, but she wore hers cropped pixie-short. Peter on the other hand, sprawled out beside Charlotte, had long, dark hair which fell messily around his face. Apart from the hair, he looked strikingly like Jasper: same tall and lanky frame, similar facial structure, even identical clefts in their chins.

Jasper had told Alice enough to know that the resemblances made perfect sense. Peter had always insisted, courtesy of his gift of ‘knowing shit’, that they were family. After escaping Maria they’d done some research and confirmed it, figuring out just _how_ they were related. Turned out Peter was Jasper’s cousin on his father’s side, while Charlotte was Jasper’s second cousin once-removed via his mother.

Serendipity really, that they’d been brought together.

“The hell were you thinking, Peter?” Jasper continued. “For future reference, our bedroom’s strictly off-limits.” His tone was commanding, and Alice realised that this was the soldier, the warrior, shining through.

“Aw, ‘our bedroom’,” Charlotte cooed, looking between the pair. “You’re really are serious then? Pete said so, but you know him.” She rolled her eyes. “Never can tell when he _knows_ , and when he’s just messing with me.”

Jasper twined his fingers with Alice who leaned into his shoulder. “Definitely serious,” he said. “True mates, even.”

Abruptly Charlotte’s sweet expression was replaced with a disgruntled look. “And you didn’t _call_? Seriously Jasper, who finds their soul mate and doesn’t even let their closest kin know?”

“Give him a break, wifey,” Peter said. “He’s been too busy enjoying the honeymoon phase. All caught up in his pretty new mate.”

Charlotte huffed, but softened. “Well, I _suppose_ … It _is_ real good to see you happy, Jasper,” she said earnestly, then elbowed Peter in the ribs. _Hard_.

Peter grimaced. “Dammit woman!” He sighed and reluctantly muttered, “Well if I gotta talk about _feelings_ … then I guess I’m shooting metaphorical rainbows and puppies and Disneylanders atcha Major.”

Alice blinked. “Disneylanders?” she asked no one in particular.

Peter explained, “Folks go there, get high on sugar and shit. Sweetens the blood.” He grinned unrepentantly.

Alice faltered, wondering but not daring to ask.

“Don’t worry, we keep our chompers off the young’uns. We’re on a strictly arsehole diet.” Peter faltered, face screwing up in disgust. “I didn’t mean that to come out how it sounded.”

Charlotte threw her head back as she burst into loud, uninhibited laughter.

Jasper snorted, also looking vastly amused. “What Peter means to say,” he explained through a smirk, “is that he and Charlotte prefer to feed on the scum of society: murderers, rapist—”

“The creepy fucks that only visit Disneyland to stare at little kids,” Peter added, and Charlotte didn’t even react to the swearing, just nodded grimly.

Alice relaxed at that. She wasn’t as lily-white as she’d once been. War inevitably changed a person, even stubborn, self-righteous, Gryffindor girl-heroes. The erasure of most of her personality-forming memories probably also had a lot to do with her new perspective.

Alice’s way of thinking these days was that, well, if Peter and Charlotte wanted to pick off _those_ sorts of people? More power to them. Though…

“What do you do in between?” she wondered aloud. At the questioning looks, she elaborated, “Between tracking down ‘scum’.”

Peter grinned and tapped his temple. “It’s never come to that. It ain’t hard to find them when I just _know_.”

“So,” Jasper said, “what brings you two to Forks? You haven’t said.”

“It was Pete’s suggestion,” Charlotte said. “I just wanted to catch up and meet your girl. He said there’s something more serious going down.”

Peter sobered and nodded. “Don’t know precisely what, just that I’m supposed to offer my services for some issue right about now.” He shrugged.

Alice’s breath caught. In a room full of vampires with super-hearing, she might as well have shouted ‘Eureka!’ She turned to Jasper and said, “The Quileutes!” Alice was sure he could feel how hopeful and excited she suddenly was. “The treaty’s between them and the Cullen coven only, right?”

Jasper’s understood at once. “Peter’s a free agent.”

Peter cleared his throat. “Well? You gonna fill me in?”

Charlotte stifled a snicker. She leaned towards Alice and confided, sotto voce, “He loves ‘knowing shit’ and waving it in everyone’s faces, but _hates it_ when _he’s_ the one outta the loop for once.”

“And the rest of us call it karma,” Jasper added, smirking at Peter, who scowled.

“Yeah, you’re all fucking hilarious,” Peter muttered. Then he yelped in pain.

“Language,” Charlotte snapped.

* * *

Edward shocked Alice by not picking Bella up and removing her from the Cullen house the moment human-drinking vampires stepped inside the next day, especially when they explained what they were there for. He surprised her further by not trying to ‘lay down the law’ and forbid it. Maybe the talk about respect and Bella’s right to make decisions had actually sunk in?

Not that Edward was okay with the idea of Bella being changed. Far from it! But he conveyed that with desperate pleas for Bella to rethink things —listing the dangers, the costs and what she’d have to give up— rather than handing down ultimatums.

“It isn’t some glamorous thing, being a vampire,” Edward argued. “It’s not just ‘together forever’, ‘love eternal’. It means giving up every aspect of your human life. Your mother, your father, your human friends … they could never know. You’d be dead to them. And you’d never be able to live a normal life, to go out when it’s sunny, to stay in any place more than a few years. You’d never grow older, never have children—”

“I’ve never wanted children anyway,” was Bella’s response.

Edward ran an impatient hand through his hair. “And what about everything else I said? And what about your _soul_ , Bella?” he pleaded. “Would you just throw away your beautiful soul?”

“Don’t say that!” Bella objected. “Vampires _do_ have souls, Edward. I know they do. I know _you_ do.”

“I don’t,” was his grim reply. “That’s what being a vampire means, Bella. It means living on the blood of others, hungering to murder innocent human beings. It means giving up your humanity, your soul.”

At that, Charlotte jumped into the conversation, snapping, “What a low-down, nasty, self-absorbed thing to say.”

“What?”

“You think vampires don’t have souls?” Charlotte scowled at Edward. “It takes a soul to love, Cullen. And I tell you now, I love my man more than anything in this world, and I know he loves me.”

“Not to mention that calling all of us here without heartbeats soul-less _things_? Means you’re essentially labelling your entire family as irredeemable monsters too,” Peter pointed out bluntly.

“Carlisle and Esme are some of the most compassionate and loving people I’ve ever had the privilege to feel, vampire _or_ human,” Jasper said then.

“And here you are calling them monsters,” Charlotte said, then repeated her earlier words. “Low-down. Nasty. Self-absorbed.”

Bella reached for the dumbstruck Edward’s hand then. “I _know_ you don’t think that way about Carlisle and Esme. Not about any of them.” She stepped closer, cupping his face in her hands. “And you’re not a monster either, Edward. You’ve done good things and, yes, terrible things too. But that’s just choices. Humans can make terrible choices as well. It’s doesn’t have anything to do with having a soul or not.”

That put Edward back on his heels a little. Not that a short conversation would change decades worth of self-destructive thinking, but at least he laid off the ‘no soul’ point after that, focussing instead on the others vampire-drawbacks he’d brought up.

As it got late, they made their excuses to leave. The argument was still going when they did so, and Alice honestly wasn’t sure how it would turn out.

“We’re gonna head off. We’ll hold off till Seattle before we rustle us up some dinner,” Peter announced as they headed for the door, slinging an arm around Charlotte’s shoulders.

Edward grimaced at the reminder of their human diet, taking an unconscious but protective step in front of Bella that made Peter roll his eyes.

“I appreciate you not hunting in our territory,” Carlisle had said diplomatically.

Peter shrugged. “I know how you Cullens get your panties in a wad about that sort of thing.”

“Bella?” Charlotte said, and the girl peered around Edward. “Jasper has our number. Call us anytime if you have questions or worries about the change. Even if you just want a fresh perspective about what it’s like, being a vampire, we’ll be happy to share. It’s a big decision. You wanna make sure you’re fully informed—no unnecessary surprises, no unavoidable regrets.”

Edward didn’t look pleased, but Bella appeared to be nothing but thankful as she nodded.

The four of them —Alice, Jasper and his kin— said their goodbyes and exited the Cullen house.

Looking between the two Whitlock men, Alice was struck yet again by the resemblance between them, only highlighted by their similar taste in clothes—both seemed to live in well-worn jeans, cowboy boots and t-shirts. The only real difference between their wardrobe was that Jasper favoured plain, well-fitted shirts —something Alice _greatly_ appreciated for how it showed off his physique— while Peter preferred looser ones with ironic or inappropriate designs. Peter’s current choice was bold red with a white cross and a slogan underneath which proclaimed him an ‘orgasm donor’. The man was shameless. Still, it had been hilarious to watch Edward’s face screw up when he first caught sight of it.

Jasper shoved his hands in his pockets and rocked back on those cowboy-booted heels. “No chance you can stick around a while?” he asked.

But Peter shook his head. “Expecting a contractor at the house day after tomorrow. We’re getting a pool put in!” he said excitedly.

Something about Peter’s words made Charlotte grimace.

Jasper nodded but sighed. “It’s just been too long since we saw each other.”

Charlotte raised an eyebrow and pointed out that, “It’s a two-way street, Jasper. You could’ve dropped by our place too.”

“She’s got a point,” Alice said, looping a hand through his elbow and leaning into him.

Jasper nodded sheepishly. “Fair enough. I guess the older I get, the more time gets away from me.”

Alice hummed thoughtfully. “Like when you’re little and a year seemed like forever?”

He shrugged. “Can’t say as I remember my human years too clearly darlin’, but it’s probably the same sort of thing.” He looked over at Charlotte and Peter. “Right, so maybe we’ll do that. Drop by.”

Jasper gave a questioning look to Alice, who nodded in agreement, while inside she warmed at his automatic ‘we’, rather than ‘I’. He gave her a curious look, feeling her mood but not quite understanding the cause.

“We’d be glad to have you.” Peter grinned. “You can check out the alligator tank.”

Charlotte groaned and buried her face in her hands.

“Alligator tank?” Alice dared to ask.

“The pool,” Charlotte said wearily. She looked up at the sky as if to ask, ‘why god, why did you stick me with _him_?’ “Peter’s been binging on old reruns of The Crocodile Hunter. Decided he wanted his own alligators in the back yard to wrestle with.”

Jasper was equal parts amused and disbelieving. “And you’re _letting_ him?”

“I lost a bet,” was the clipped response.

Peter however was more forthcoming, explaining that, “She thought I couldn’t—”

“Don’t you dare!” Charlotte hissed warningly. “Those details ain’t no one’s business but ours.”

Peter skipped back out of reach as she swiped at him. “—make hercome more’n a hundred times in a single day,” he finished, a shit-eating smirk in place. He waggled his eyebrows. “I sure showed her.” And then he turned and bolted.

Charlotte stood frozen in place for a long moment, fists clenched at her side. Then, eerily calm, she looked back at Jasper and Alice with a perfectly mannered smile. “Please excuse my abrupt parting,” she said sweetly, “but I’ve got a mate to emasculate.” As she stomped towards the trees, slowly picking up pace, the last thing they heard from her was, “Not gonna see his balls again for a _month_!”

A long silence followed the couple’s departure.

“So, Peter…” Alice drawled. “Stupidly brave, or just _utterly_ lacking in self-preservation instincts?”

“Oh, definitely the latter,” Jasper said with a sigh, but there was a grin on his lips. “Come on darlin’, let’s go home.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For those who may be wondering, re: the differences between the canon timeline and this one … strangely, without the benefit of foresight, things went a lot smoother here. You’d expect the opposite to be true, right? Apparently not.
> 
> Without canon-Alice to push the relationship along, and reassure Edward of his control, the Bella/Edward romance took a much slower, more ponderous pace. Like Bella said in an earlier chapter, Edward was MIA for _months_ before he got the courage to return to school. And then he was more cautious in his approach of Bella.
> 
> The couple were either not together yet, or not close enough, for Bella to be invited to the baseball game. Edward mightn’t even have returned to school by that point actually. Either way, James et al. just continued on their way through. There was no Bella-hunt, and no James killed leaving a vengeful Victoria to create a newborn army, no inevitable alerting the Volturi, etc.
> 
> In addition, without Alice to push the birthday party thing (cause yeah, I totally imagine that as a canon-Alice idea) the Paper Cut O’ Doom© never occurred. This in turn meant Edward didn’t panic and make the family leave. Not abandoned, Bella didn’t cling to Jacob and eventually find out about the wolves, so the whole love triangle drama is skipped too. (And just to make doubly sure? In that scene when one of the wolves imprinted on Angela (you caught that, right?), it was Jacob.)
> 
> (What do you mean this is all _awfully convenient_? My desire for a relatively drama-free fem!Harry/Jasper romance has _nothing_ to do with it! Oh fine, maybe a _bit_ to do with it. But there will be _some_ drama. A bit. A tiny bit. *pouts*)


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’ve been writing _so much_ lately. It’s great! And as a result, you all finally get an update. Hope you like it.

It only took Bella a week to come to a decision.

According to Bella, Peter’s response when she called to inform him had been accepting and not at all surprised. “Alright kid,” he simply told her. “Just name the time and place and I’ll be there.”

After that a family meeting was called to try and decide when that time and place would be. For the first time Alice was invited to attend, possibly because Bella asked her to be there. Still, it warmed her to be included in ‘family business’.

Alice was lounging on the sofa when everyone began filtering into the living room. Jasper had just gotten up for something to read, and so found himself leaning against the wall by one of the bookshelves as the meeting began. His arms were crossed and there was a thoughtful frown on his face as he listened, no doubt considering risks and benefits and contingency plans.

“I’ve decided on after graduation,” Bella said.

She was leaning into Edward’s side as he held her hand as tightly as he safely could. There was torn expression on his face. He was still not supportive of the idea of Bella being changed, but had seemingly resigned himself to the inevitable.

Alice hummed. “For your dad, right?”

Bella nodded back. “I told Charlotte about my idea —to disappear while on a pretend gap-year after high school, before starting college— and she expanded on it. She said I won’t have to fake my death right off if I go this route. That was a relief. I know it’d crush Charlie. Renee too.”

“It may take longer than a year before you’re safe around humans,” Jasper warned, decades of experience backing his words up.

“Yeah, I know.”

“Not to mention you’ll _look_ different,” Edward added. “It might raise too many questions. Maybe,” he suggested hesitantly, but without much hope, “you could put it off for now.”

When Bella shook her head, Edward sighed. She gave him an apologetic look, before turning back to the others and explaining that, “Charlotte suggested I could keep in contact with my parents via email. Or snail mail more likely in Charlie’s case—he’s not so good with technology. And maybe phone calls if my voice isn’t _too_ much a giveaway.” There was a sad but determined look on her face as she explained. “So far as they know, I’ll just keep extending my gap-year. Say I enjoy travelling too much, and that’s why I haven’t come home or settled at a college.”

There were nods all around as everyone agreed that the plan was feasible.

“But what about the where?” Emmett said. “We can’t do it here or the wolves will lose their shit.”

“Language,” Esme chided.

“Sorry Mum,” Emmett apologised cheekily. Then he looked excited as something occurred to him. “Could be fun though, getting the wolves riled. Haven’t had a good fight in _ages_.”

“Absolutely not,” Carlisle said sternly, that rarely-used command of a Coven leader in his tone.

Emmett deflated. And then further still when Rosalie said, “You stay away from those mutts. Is swear, if you come home smelling like disgusting, wet dog, I won’t let you touch me.”

“Back to the where, though…” Alice said, bringing the conversation back on track.

“I’ve been thinking Denali, up in Alaska, would be best,” Carlisle said. “It’s remote, so you’re unlikely to run across any humans. Ideal for a newborn,”

“And we have family there,” Esme added, nodding. “So you won’t just be roaming the wild for a year, Bella. You’ll have a roof over your head.”

“And hosts who’ll be understanding when you inevitably break a few doorknobs,” Jasper added wryly.

“Family?” Bella asked. “I think you’ve mentioned them before. Were some of them changed by Carlisle too, or…?”

“Family of choice,” Carlisle said kindly. “Not of blood or venom. We consider them cousins, their coven affiliated with ours.”

“We have some similar values,” Edward explained. “Those are what bind us.”

“Which is Edward’s fancy-schmancy way of saying they prefer to chow down on animals too,” Emmett said, rolling his eyes at his brother.

“Oh!” Bella looked quite interested to hear that there were other ‘vegetarian’ vampires out there. Then she paused, biting her lip. “Are you sure they won’t mind? I don’t want to be an imposition.”

“They won’t mind at all, I’ve already checked,” Carlisle assured her. “They even took in another newborn recently, so it’s fresh in their mind, what they’re getting into.”

“What? We have a new cousin?” Emmett pouted. “Why’d no one tell me? _That_ could be the fight I’m looking for. Newborns are always so fun, all souped up and super-strong.”

“They’re … having some trouble with him.”

Jasper tensed. “What sort of trouble?”

Alice rose from the sofa and casually moved to where Jasper stood by the bookshelves. She leaned into him when she got to his side, to offer what comfort she could. Alice knew Jasper’s past, knew that _he_ knew very well how dangerous an unstable newborn could be.

“Not newborn-trouble,” Carlisle quickly assured him, understanding the same as Alice did. “He’s a few years old now.”

“Aw,” Emmet whined, put out that their cousin’s super-strong newborn year had already passed him by.

Jasper, however, relaxed a bit. “Then what’s the problem?”

“He’s not handling the change well,” Esme said, compassion in her tone and a sad look upon her face. Obviously Carlisle had filled his mate in, even if no one else. “They’ve been keeping him quiet because…”

“They were afraid he might give up,” Carlisle explained delicately, when Esme couldn’t bring herself to say it.

There was a moment of silence as they all took that in, understanding that Carlisle meant this vampire might just have given up on _living_. Or un-living, as the case may be.

“Damn, that’s heavy,” Emmett said loudly, breaking the silence in his usual blunt manner. “Seems like a bullshit way to help though, hiding him away.”

“He’s right,” Jasper agreed. “I think we can all agree I’m the best-informed when it comes to psychology. Isolation is never the way to go if you’re looking to help someone with depression. Not unless they’re a danger to others.”

Edward tensed. “ _Is_ he?” he asked, Bella’s hand gripped tightly, protectively, in his own. He was staring at Carlisle with that intensity that said he was ‘listening in’.

“No, not at all,” Carlisle said, and the way Edward relaxed said it was the truth.

“Then we should totally go with Bella and visit him!” Emmett decided. “Welcome him to the family and all. Cheer him up.”

“You know,” Esme said, shooting hopeful looks around the room, “I think that’d be a _wonderful_ idea.”

You’d have to be an evil soul-less fiend to turn down Esme when she looked like that. Soon the others had all agreed, with varying levels of enthusiasm. Only Jasper hesitated, looking to Alice.

“It’s fine,” she assured him. “I know with Bella there, being all newborn-crazy, I won’t be able to go with you. But I think, of anyone, _you’re_ probably best suited to help this guy.” She was referring, of course, to his psychology experience and empathy.

Jasper nodded slowly and pressed a firm kiss to her temple.

Rosalie finally deigned to speak up for the first time since the conversation started. “Do we get to know this guy’s name?” she asked with an irritated sigh. It had taken Esme’s hopeful glances and Emmett’s puppy-eyed pleading combined to get her to bin her plans for fashion week in Milan in favour of bleak Alaska. “Since he’s family and all, we probably ought to know.”

What happened next changed _everything_.

“Sirius,” Carlisle provided. “His name is Sirius Black.”

Alice’s knees went weak with her shock, and only Jasper’s firm grip held her up.

* * *

Alice’s packing was akin to a whirlwind. She didn’t bother with the Muggle way, just whipped her wand, making clothes and bits and bobs fly around the room and settle in her suitcase which she shut with firm, quick motions.

“Here, let me carry—” Were he not a vampire, Jasper would probably have stumbled at the urgency with which Alice complied, shoving her luggage at him before grabbing his wrist and yanking him downstairs. Of course, she hadn’t the strength to force a vampire anywhere, but her riotous emotional state made Jasper cooperate.

“Where is everyone else?” Alice demanded as they re-entered the living room, finding it devoid of anyone but Edward and Bella—they had to stay behind another two weeks until they finished out the school year.

“Still packing,” Edward said after cocking his head towards the stairs to listen.

Or maybe ‘listen’.

Alice actually didn’t care about the boy’s privacy-invading issues right now. She was too on-edge, too impatient to get going.

She actually jumped and made squeaking noise when arms wrapped around her. When she realised it was Jasper, her hands rose to clench around his arms.

“Darlin’,” he whispered in her ear, though of course the privacy was an illusion, and every vampire in the house no doubt heard. “You’re all _over_ the place. I’m gonna start climbing the walls myself if you don’t take a moment to breathe.”

“Sorry, sorry, it’s just…” She shut her eyes against her tears and swallowed hard. “I searched for _years_ and _nothing_. I mean, now I know it’s probably because he was a vampire and I couldn’t See him, but… He’s the closes thing I remember having to a father, and I thought he was _dead_ , Jasper. _Twice_ I’ve thought him dead.”

“I know, I know. It’s alright sweetheart,” he murmured. “It’s gonna be all right.”

“How can it be? Carlisle said he’s _given up_ ,” Alice whispered back in a wavering tone.

The arms around her tightened, a flinch. With a pang of guilt Alice realised that Jasper was probably feeling the full force of her devastation. She hurriedly tried to reel it in, but it was hard.

“I—” She paused to lick her lips. “You can calm me, if you like.”

Immediately a wave of serenity washed over her, stronger than anything she’d ever felt from him before, sweeping her under. Eyes a bit glazed, Alice slumped in Jasper’s arms as he gave a sigh of relief and held her up.

“Kinda overkill,” she mumbled.

“Didn’t think anything less would work,” Jasper admitted. “Is it okay?”

Alice hummed in understanding, in acceptance, then turned in his embrace. She wrapped weak arms around Jasper’s neck and let him take all her weight, nosing the crook of his neck in hazy contentment.

“Catch,” Jasper said, before tossing her suitcase towards the stairs.

Alice rolled her head to one side and blinked sleepily at the sight of the family finally present and packed. Esme gave her a soft look, and Emmett even refrained from a tactless comment.

“Go now?” Alice mumbled.

“Yeah, sweetheart.”

“Sweetheart,” she cooed back. Then she blinked, the motion languorous. “I’m kinda high, huh?”

There was some quiet laughter, but Alice didn’t know from whom.

Jasper gently picked her up, one arm under her, the other around her back to hold her close. Alice managed to wrap her uncoordinated legs around Jasper’s waist and settled against him with a contented sigh.

She heard, as if from a distance, voices discussing … something. Transportation maybe? But Alice’s eyelids were feeling heavy, and before she knew it she had drifted off to sleep.

* * *

When Alice awoke, that false-calm was gone and a natural —if sleepy— one had taken its place. She yawned and stretched, blinking when one arm impacted with a hard chest. She turned to see Jasper next to her, in the driver’s seat of his car.

“Hey,” she said softly, turning to the side to see him better, curling her legs under her. She managed to get a glance of the back seat and see that it was only them. The others must have taken their own vehicles.

“Hey,” Jasper returned, just a softly. Then, “Not mad at me?” he asked with slight uncertainty.

It took Alice a moment to realise what he was getting at —his basically doping her up on empathic calm— and then she shook her head. “No, of course not. I was the one who suggested it.”

“Yeah, but you weren’t expecting _quite_ that much.”

Alice shrugged. “You double-checked with me after you did it. I was still okay with it.”

“Some might argue you weren’t in a state to judge.”

Alice rolled her eyes and shifted to get a little more comfortable. She reached out to gently touch the back of his hand on the gearstick, and did her best to project love and calm and acceptance as she said, “I don’t want to ever hurt you. Especially not due to a lack of self-control.”

Jasper gave a shuddering sigh, eyes fluttering shut and lips curling in a slight smile.

“I love you and all Jasper,” Alice said, seemingly-tranquil, “but if you don’t start paying attention to the road, this lovely, still-sleepy calm of mine is going to be tossed out the window.”

Jasper huffed a laugh, blinking his eyes open and giving her an amused, infinitely-fond look.

“No, but seriously. As flattering as that look in your eyes is, the trees are a _blur_ you’re going so fast. And you’ve not even glanced at the road once since I woke up. Recipe. For. Disaster.”

“Vampire, remember? Excellent peripheral vision, cognitive processing and reflexes.”

“Don’t _care_ ,” she sing-songed back. “Just humour my human sensibilities, alright?”

Jasper laughed again, louder this time. He reached out a hand to tuck a stray curl behind her ear then turned his gaze to the front as requested.

“Thanks,” Alice murmured.

“Anything for you, darlin’.”

* * *

Their car was the last to arrive at the Denali Coven’s home. Only a few seconds after the others, true, but it was still enough to make Alice antsy. She was keeping a strong leash on her emotions though, determined not to let herself get in as bad a state as before—so emotionally unstable that she _hurt_ Jasper.

In a split second after they’d parked, and Jasper had exited the vehicle, zoomed around to her side and held open the door for her.

Alice took his hand and let him help her out in a daze. She barely heard the introductions being made and the welcome offered by the Denali, eyes instead fixed on the sight of a large, black dog slumped under a tree off to one side. Snow was piled atop it, like it had been laying there for hours and just didn’t care enough to come in out of the cold.

Alice was only vaguely aware that she was being rude, ignoring their hosts and then walking away from them, cutting them off mid-sentence. But all her attention was focussed in that dog, on what could only be _Padfoot_.

He didn’t look up as she approached, nor as she collapsed beside him, snow freezing her knees through her too-light skirt—she’d been in such a hurry to leave, not even taking time to find something warmer to wear. Alice didn’t feel the cold though, not even when she reached a shaky, bare hand out to brush the snow off Padfoot, who still ignored her.

There were hushed whispered going on behind her, she knew. Though to her ears it sounded more like an almost-inaudible buzzing sound.

Finally she had gotten rid of all the snow, and still the dog lay still. Almost _deadly_ still. The thought made her heart clenched for a moment, and was enough to loosen her tongue, to let her whisper a shaky, “ _Sirius_?”

The dog’s head jerked up so fast Alice gasped.

And then, between one breath and the next, Padfoot was gone and a Sirius was in his place. But this was a version of the man she’d never seen. Gone was the gaunt-ness Azkaban had brought. He was physically healthy and whole again, and even by vampire standards he was stunning. Handsomer even than the photographs she’d seen of him at her parents’ wedding.

“ _Alice_?” he croaked out, eyes wide in disbelief. “How… Merlin, have I finally cracked?”

She laughed —it sounded more like a tearful hiccup— and shook head. “Had an unexpected trip through the Veil. Ended up on this side. I looked for you,” she said heavily. “For _ages_ I looked.”

Sirius’s mouth opened and shut several times, clearly at a loss for words.

“I couldn’t See you. And none of the tracking spells turned up anything.”

“That’s probably my fault,” Sirius confessed faintly. “I packed on anti-tracking spells after escaping Azkaban and never removed them and— _oh Merlin_ , who _cares_ about tracking spells when my _goddaughter is here_!”

Alice quickly found herself scooped into a careful but entirely enthusiastic hug and being spun around. She threw her head back and laughed, gleeful.

As they turned she kept catching glances of the others, and of Jasper especially, and she realised she’d overwhelmed him again. It was different this time though. Instead of flinching in pain, Jasper was smiling —one of those rare, unfettered grins of his— as Alice’s love and relief and _joy_ poured into him.

Alice closed her eyes, smiling as she clung to a laughing Sirius, knowing Jasper was just a few yards away, grinning too.

She wondered if she’d ever been as happy as in this moment.


	10. Chapter 10

According to the Denali, Sirius was showing more life than they’d ever seen. They were delighted with the changes in their coven-mate, and immensely grateful to Alice for being the one to bring them about.

However, whenever _Alice_ looked at Sirius, she could still see grief lingering behind his eyes and the brittleness to his smiles. She also hadn’t missed the mournful silences he often fell into when alone. She wasn’t just imagining it either—Jasper confirmed his emotional state when she asked. And Alice?

Well, she was getting sick of it.

It wasn’t that she wasn’t sympathetic. God no! She knew just _why_ Sirius still grieved, and the idea of losing one’s magic was _horrifying_. A part of Alice —a not inconsiderable part— had been desperately hoping that magic would carry over in the transformation. The fact that she now had proof it _wouldn’t_ was making a certain decision of hers a thousand times harder.

But, her own uncertainties weren’t the point right now. Sirius was.

Alice knew pity wasn’t what her godfather needed to snap himself out of his depression. It wasn’t how he ticked, so to speak. And so, when she sat down beside him a week after arriving in Denali, Alice bluntly stated, “You’re gonna cut it out with this moping bullshit soon, right?”

“ _What_? That’s—”

“I mean, for Merlin’s sake, you’ve got three gorgeous women trying to get into your pants,” Alice muttered. And it was true. Sirius was gorgeous, and the Denali sisters apparently had few reservations so far as sex went, so long as everyone enjoyed themselves. Tanya in particular eyed Sirius up whenever he entered a room. “If you’re even half the man-whore Remus’s stories made you out to be, you should consider yourself in heaven.”

“He told you that?” Sirius squawked, looking appalled.

Alice laughed. “Remus agrees that it was _hilarious_ how determined you were to pretend I was a sweet innocent flower who would be … I don’t know, mentally scarred or something, just from hearing stories of your whorish youth.”

“You _are_ a sweet innocent flower!”

She rolled her eyes. “I killed a man at age eleven,” she reminded him, thinking of Quirrell, “and broke enough school rules to challenge yours and my dad’s records _combined_. Oh, and then there was that whole ‘defying my own government’ thing which I suspect may technically count as treason.” She gave him a taunting look, just knowing the next part would break him. “And I assure you, even before Jasper, I was hardly _innocent_.”

The emphasis on the word —with waggled eyebrows for good measure— really left no room for misunderstanding. Alice watched, amused, as Sirius’s eyes went wide in horror. He grabbed fistfuls of his hair and shook his head, shouting, “Noooo! I’m _not hearing this_!”

Alice, dutiful and kind goddaughter that she was, cackled with glee and generally enjoyed his pain. Then Sirius regained his sanity enough to notice a certain point she’d mentioned…

“Wait, this Jasper bastard touched my precious goddaughter _too_?” he snarled, looking ready to kill.

Alice gave him a sharp look and conspicuously fingered her wand. “Did I happen to mention I learned the castration curse?”

Sirius made a horrified noise as he crossed his legs. “Alice!”

She rolled her eyes. “And how is Jasper and I news to you? We don’t exactly hide that we’re together.”

“I figured you just held hands! And maybe, sometimes, very rarely, there would be an awkward kiss. On the cheek!” he hurriedly added.

Alice just stared. “The denial runs deep I see.”

“If I’d know it was, was—” Sirius choked, unable to say it, shuddering in horror. And then that murderous expression returned. “If I’d know, I would have _killed him_ by now.”

“Castration Curse, godfather dearest,” Alice sweetly reminded him, pleased to see Sirius cringe and back down once more. “Really, don’t try anything. If not for fear of your bits, then…” She smiled softly. “Then because I love him.”

Sirius faltered. He studied her closely. “He’s good to you? Makes you happy?” he asked with rare gravity.

“So good. _Unbelievably_ happy. He loves me too.” She added, in a wondering tone, “He’s my soulmate, Sirius. My true mate.”

Her godfather gave a defeated sigh. “Fine,” he muttered petulantly. “I guess … I really _can’t_ kill him then.” He did not look happy at this realisation.

“Because it’d break my heart and crush my spirit,” Alice chirpily agreed with a wide smile.

“ _Stop it_ ,” Sirius whined, but there was a smile tugging reluctantly at his lips. A _real_ one, not one of those brittle fakes. “Now you’re just rubbing it in.”

* * *

“So, you haven’t told me yet, but how did you end up all sparkly?”

“I know! I’m like a living diamond!” Sirius smirked, the expression dripping with ‘you know I’m gorgeous’. “Totally sexy, right?”

Alice gave him a disbelieving look. She’d expected some sort of bluster, defending of his masculinity. She should have known better. Sirius was a vain thing, but he hated to conform to traditional expectations.

“You’re a pretty, pretty princess,” Alice deadpanned.

Sirius actually _preened_ in response. He turned his head _just so_ and a beam of sunlight fell across one cheekbone, highlighting the sharp edge by reflecting back a dazzling rainbow of light.

Alice tried to look flatly unimpressed. Really she did. But in the end she ended up shaking with laughter, muffling the sound into the hands she pressed to her face.

“It’s alright, goddaughter-mine. Many have been overcome by the Sirius Black-charm. You’re not the first.”

“Shut _up_ , you dork, and tell me how you were changed already.”

“Ah.” The tone was so suddenly-grim that Alice looked up, finding a dark expression on Sirius’s face as he spat out, “Volturi.”

She blinked. “The vampire kings?”

Sirius grimaced. “No kings of mine, that’s for blood sure.”

“What did they do, Sirius?” Alice asked, fingering her wand. “And who do I need to curse?”

His expression then was such a strange mix of emotions: pain and loss as he looked at the wand —his own was useless to him now— surprise at the role reversal of who should be looking out for whom, and amusement at her willingness to do violence on his behalf.

“Well?” she demanded.

Sirius gave a bark of laughter. “No, don’t go starting a war on my account. They’re not worth it, and they leave me alone now.” He sighed. “It was one of their ‘acquirers’ that changed me. He saw me do magic and next thing I know I’m spending three days in Crucio-like agony, waking up with a craving for blood and…”

“And your magic gone,” Alice said gently, when he couldn’t.

“Yeah.” He cleared his throat, running a hand through his hair. After a pause he huffed and shot her a small but genuine grin, one laced with a bit of sadism. “Pretty sure my ‘maker’ is dead by now. The Volturi were _pissed_ that he’d acted without consulting them first. I think maybe they wouldn’t’ve cared if I kept the magic, but since I didn’t, they saw it as my maker having deprived them of a seriously powerful asset.”

“Did they take any of this anger out on _you_?” she asked.

“No, surprisingly. They like to pretend to be civilized, less than the monsters they really are—and I’m not talking about their vampirism. But yeah, the need to put on a good face made them courteous towards me while I was there.”

“Really? No problems at all?”

“Well … they all sneered worse than Snivellus when I kept picking off the local wildlife population, rather than helping myself to their murder buffet. There was an attempt to pressure me into conforming to their diet, but when I locked myself in the most remote dungeon I could find in their pretentious palace and tried to starve myself to death, they eventually gave up on it and contacted Eleazar to take me in.”

“Eleazar?”

“He used to work for them. His gift is gift-sensing. He left after he found Carmen, and couldn’t quite balance his work with his love life or something.” Sirius shrugged. “I think Carmen wasn’t comfortable with the Volturi’s methods, which is like a million points in her favour.”

“And I suppose Eleazar was chosen because of the Denali Coven’s ‘vegetarianism’.”

“Mhmm. There was a second or two though, after Eleazar first showed up to get me, where they almost changed their minds. Eleazar sensed that I was gifted right off, but the extent of it surprised even me. I’d known I still had Padfoot —I kept it under wraps though— but it was Eleazar that realised I can take _any_ canine form now.

“Aro,” Sirius spat, disdain for the Volturi king clear, “he has this mind-reading thing and no care for invading the privacy of everyone he can get his hands on, so he saw it as soon as he shook Eleazar’s hand. Apparently a shapeshifting vamp was enough of a novelty that he wanted to keep me around.

“Hell if I was gonna be his ‘pet dog’ though. I told Aro no way in hell, and that I’d make _his life_ hell if he tried to keep me. And then Caius —he’s a regular Malfoy-lookalike, that one, and just as snotty— chimed in something about my gift being far too reminiscent of the ‘Children Of The Moon’. Werewolves, you know.”

Alice nodded. Jasper had mentioned these ‘Children Of The Moon’, explaining how they were different to the Quileute wolf-shifters. Everything he told her connected pretty flawlessly to werewolves as she knew them. She’d wondered if at some point a werewolf hadn’t been pushed through the Veil, passed that worthiness test in the cave as Alice and Sirius had, and consequently brought the curse into this world.

Jasper had also told Alice how the one called Caius had gone genocidal after a werewolf almost killed him a few centuries back, deciding that they all needed to die. That in mind, she wasn’t thrilled to hear that Caius had compared Sirius to a race he had a psychopathic hate-on for.

“Did he do anything?” she asked tensely.

“The pasty boy-king said he didn’t care how much I would amuse Aro, he refused put up with a ‘filthy mongrel’ in his presence.” Sirius wrinkled his nose. “’Course, I couldn’t let an insult like that slide.”

“Oh Merlin,” she groaned, equal parts dismayed and eager to know more. The latter won out. “What did you _do_?”

Sirius’s smirk was more than a little wicked. “I detoured past his wing of the palace on my way out, transformed and cocked a leg on his door.” His smirked widened. “Taking vampire senses into account, it’ll take _ages_ for the smell to fade, not matter how much he has the servants scrub it down.”

Alice burst into giggles.

* * *

Alice would be pissed —like _really_ pissed— if she weren’t so busy being mortified and trying to hide it.

She’d been riding Jasper to what promised to be a _fantastic_ finish when they were interrupted by a girlish scream of unending horror…

…coming from Sirius.

Everyone came running at the sound, alarmed and worried, appearing in the blink of an eye. Fortunately Jasper reacted just as quickly so Alice was properly covered with a sheet before the Cullens and Denali could get a good look at her naked self.

“No, my _eyes_!” Sirius was howling as he rolled on the floor.

Tanya was kneeling at his side, a frown marring her pretty face as she held his wrists. “Stop trying to claw your eyes out,” she ordered.

“I have to. I have to make it _go away_!” Sirius moaned. “My brain, my poor brain. I have to bleach it and, and… _Why_ , Alice? Why did you _do_ this to me?”

Alice, curled up in Jasper’s lap with her face in her hands, peeked out from between her fingers. She was pretty sure she was blushing red enough to put Bella to shame as she muttered, “Me? You’re the one who didn’t even knock!”

“You should have _warned_ me!” And then Sirius actually sobbed a bit. “If I’d known, I would never have… But there was nothing, no suspicious noises or smells.” He paused and grimaced at that thought, slumping into Tanya’s embrace and letting her pet his hair soothingly. “No warning at all,” he whined.

The audience to the drama seemed fairly split between sympathetic and amused. Emmet was of the latter category, outright guffawing. So too was Kate, who had collapsed against Irina’s side, the other having to hold her up as she laughed.

“Okay, no,” Alice snapped, anger beginning to outweigh embarrassment. She crossed her arms over the sheet she was wearing and turning a glare in her godfather’s direction. He couldn’t quite meet her gaze. “This is not my fault! I _was_ being thoughtful to your … delicate sensibilities.”

“Not _delicate_!” he yelped, offended, but was ignored.

“There were silencing and scent-blocking spells up. It’s not my fault you have all the manners of someone raised in a barn, and thought it was okay to barge into the bedroom of your adult, sexu—”

There was another piercing, too-feminine shriek. “ _Don’t say that word_!” Sirius cried.

“—sexually-active goddaughter,” Alice finished firmly.

“Tanya, lovely Tanya, do you see how she torments me?” Sirius moaned.

Tanya rolled her eyes and petted his hair a bit more. “You poor baby,” she deadpanned, obviously biting her lip not to laugh.

“You could have just … _not_. Not anywhere near me,” Sirius suggested to Alice. “Is that so much to ask?”

“I’m not taking a vow of chastity whenever you’re around Sirius,” Alice said firmly. “Because then you’d _always_ be around. I know you would.”

Sirius avoided her eyes a bit more assiduously, looking put out that his plan was foiled before it even got off the ground.

“We could always hang a sock on the door,” Jasper suggested in a drawl of barely-suppressed amusement from behind Alice.

“ _You_!” Sirius snarled — _actually_ snarled— eyes narrowed as he pointed an accusing finger at Jasper. “You don’t get to _talk to me_! You, you … _goddaughter-defiler_!” he screeched, eyes wide and wild. “I’ll turn into a fucking dire wolf and _eat you_. _Don’t think I won’t_!”

Silence followed Sirius’s sudden descent into madness, none one quite sure what to say.

It was broken by a loud, inelegant snort of laughter. Every head turned in surprise. Because had that really come from the ever-dignified _Esme_?

The woman in questions flapped a hand in front of her face as she tried to speak. “I’m sorry,” she finally said faintly, hiccupping, “I just… And it’s so _ridiculous_ , that…” And then the woman collapsed into a fit of giggles.

There were some exchanged looks … and then everyone was laughter along.

Well, not Sirius. He was too busy pouting.

“T _an_ -ya,” he whined, giving the woman a pitiful look. “They’re being mean to me. _Laughing at my pain_!”

“Poor baby,” she once more deadpanned. Then, with a smirk, she pulled his head closer to her, comforting petting taking a turn for the seductive. “Here, let Tanya soothe _all_ your hurts,” she said in a husky tone.

Sirius —face buried between her breasts— seemed to ponder this for a moment. Just a moment. “Hmm, you know what?” he said, popping to his feet with a squealing, laughing Tanya thrown over one shoulder. There was a very determined expression on his face as he said, “The only way to sooth my wounded psyche is to drown out the horrible, _horrible_ mental images with something different, something the _opposite_ of horrible.”

Tanya tossed her head to one side, gathering the fall her strawberry blonde hair out of her face by twisting it in a bun at her nape. There was a smirk on her face as she reached down and slapped Sirius on the arse declaring, “Well, what are you waiting for? You’ve an enthusiastic volunteer and a plan, clearly. Are you gonna keep me waiting?”

“Never,” Sirius declared, then marched off.

Tanya waved her family an upside-down goodbye, completely with cheeky wink. She even returned Emmett’s thumbs-up gesture.

Their departure was followed by hoots, whistles, laughter and fond smiles all around.

Except for one.

“Darlin’?” Jasper asked, sensing her conflicted emotions.

Alice stared until everyone had left and Carlisle, the last, had politely shut their door behind him.

“Alice?” Jasper asked again.

She gave a sigh. “It’s just, I think I understand how he feels.” She paused, and then laughed a bit. “Okay, not _completely_. I’m not on the verge of a psychotic break, but… I’m glad to see him happy now. Really, _really_ glad. It’s just kind of…” She wrinkled her nose and shuddered. “Icky? Yes, icky, to know what my godfather and Tanya are probably up to right now.”

Jasper laughed, a low chuckle that transformed into a purr mid-exhale, his chest rumbling against her back.

Alice leaned further into his embrace, the better to feel the vibration. She gave a sigh of mixed contentment and regret. The latter because Sirius’s interruption had pretty much destroyed the mood. And what a mood it had been!

Jasper’s arms tightened around her. He leaned back, shuffling towards the headboard, bringing her with him. Alice closed her eyes and hummed as Jasper’s fingers began to card through her hair, gently twisting and twining and transforming her usually-unruly mess into one of his braided masterpieces.

And, yeah, okay. Not so much with the regret after all. It wasn’t as explosive as sex, but being curled up with Jasper like this —quiet and content, the focus of his attention— was its own sort of pleasure.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _So many people_ seemed to assume Sirius still had his magic, despite no more evidence than Padfoot.
> 
> I guess I can sort of understand why, but on the other hand: it’s canon that twilight-vampires sometimes retain a magically-enhanced version of a pre-change ability. I say ‘magical’ because despite what Meyers said, I just can’t fathom that all of them have a scientific base—some are just too out there, or very mystical-seeming.
> 
> So yeah, I hope there wasn’t too much disappointment, but Sirius does _not_ have magic. The ability he retained, his ‘gift’, is his Animagus transformation. The enhancement is that it’s a bit more diverse than before—instead of just Padfoot, he can pretty much pick any canine form.
> 
> The implications of all this magic-loss business does, of course, make that decision of Alice’s a bit more complicated.
> 
> ALSO:
> 
> I didn’t realise till after writing it that, as a vampire, Sirius shouldn’t be able to … ahem, ‘cock his leg on a door’. No bodily functions, no urination, etcetera and so on. But, well, I liked that bit so much I’m leaving it in. Call it an inexplicable aspect of Sirius’s gift—doesn’t just _turn into_ dogs, he can _pee like them_ too! Classy, right?


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m _ba_ -ack!
> 
> So, there’s some adult content this chapter. Feel free to skim over that if it’s not your cup of tea—like, when it gets too racy for you, start scrolling down to the next line break to escape it. Or just above the line break.
> 
> I actually blushed a bit writing this one, mainly because I’ve never written—or _imagined_ writing—phone sex before. But yup, I went there. It’s … an interesting dynamic.

“So, guess what I did today?”

“Do I want to know?” Jasper asked from the other end of the line. “Because if it involves the unholy alliance of Peter and Sirius, well…”

Alice laughed, because yes, those two _were_ a match made in hell or somewhere equally wicked.

When Bella had finally made it to Denali to be changed, Peter was waiting. And once the change was started, Alice knew it was time for her to leave, before Bella awoke a bloodthirsty newborn.

Somehow, during the mere hour he’d been there —Peter’s gift allowed him to be uncannily punctual at times— Peter and Sirius had met and hit it off, in a double-trouble sort of way.

Sirius had already been set on accompanying Alice when she left, so she wouldn’t be alone. Jasper had reluctantly agreed to Edward’s request he stay and help with Bella, being the most skilled with newborns. Peter, upon hearing of Sirius’s plans, had decided to tag along with Alice too. Apparently he had nothing better to do, since Charlotte had banished him for a month after he thought it would be a good idea to give the alligators free run of the house while she was out. It was … not a good idea at all, it turned out.

The result of all this was that Alice found herself road-tripping across America with two of the most mischievous vampires in the world. The experience was alternately hilarious and horrifying.

“It doesn’t involve Peter,” she told Jasper.

“Sirius though?”

“Mhmm.” She collapsed back on her hotel room bed, wincing at the mirrored ceiling—Peter and Sirius _really_ shouldn’t be allowed to choose their accommodations. “And I know you’re still hesitant, because Merlin knows Sirius can cause a headache just on his own, but I’m going to tell you anyway.”

“Oh?”

“Yep. I had a godfather-goddaughter chat with him this afternoon while Peter was out doing…” She paused, considering. “You know, I’m not sure what? He mentioned something about pink food dye, blue cheese and lamas.”

“…I don’t think I want to know.”

“Me either,” Alice agreed. “So. Godfather-goddaughter chat. I got to witness the first vampire heart attack.”

“Vampires can’t get heart attacks.”

“That’s what I though too. And yet Sirius very clearly clutched at his chest and collapsed in the marshmallow pool.”

“Marshmallow pool?”

Alice squinted off to one side. “You probably don’t want to know that either. I wish I could _un_ -know it.”

“Right.” There was a slight chuckle across the line. “So what prompted this ‘heart attack’?”

Alice was silent for a moment. “I told him our contingency plan. The whole ‘you can change me if it’s life-or-death’ thing. He needed to know in case, you know, something happens while we’re travelling. I also mentioned that we’ve talked about it, and I’m considering the change as more than a last-resort option.”

“Ah,” Jasper breathed out. “I see. He didn’t take it well?”

“No, it’s not that. Not quite. He was… He was mostly just surprised.”

“Heart attack-level surprised?”

“Shocked then. He was shocked. It’s kind of a big deal.” She curled up on her side and closed her eyes. “Magic is… It’s _life_ , to us. Losing it is extremely rare, generally the result of a dark, magically-binding contract being broken. I didn’t realise,” she said in a hushed tone, “but Sirius tells me the suicide rate for those who suffer magic-loss is somewhere around ninety-eight percent.”

Jasper sucked in a sharp breath. “Damn, I wish I was there with you.”

“Me too,” she murmured.

“You won’t…” He trailed off and there was a sound, very faintly, like he was dragging one hand through his hair. “You have to know I’ll support whatever you choose. I want forever with you, of course I do. But darlin’, don’t you ever dare to choose it on my account. Not if—”

“I know,” she cut him off, but her tone was soft. She blinked her eyes open and rolled onto her back again, feet dangling off the edge of the bed. “And if I decide to be changed, emergency contingency aside, it’ll be for _me_. Because I want it, and it’s something I think I can live with.”

“Good,” he said roughly.

“Love you,” Alice whispered.

“Love _you_.”

As Alice stared at the blatantly suggestive mirror above, an idea occurred to her, a way to break tense mood. “So … what are you wearing?” she asked whimsically.

There was a pause. “Really darlin’?” Jasper asked in a mirthful tone. “ _Really_?”

Alice collapsed into giggles.

“…Jeans, boots and a black shirt.”

Alice’s giggles abruptly cut off as she gasped. She blinked up at her wide-eyed reflection, and then her lips curled in a smile.

“And you?” Jasper asked.

“A dress.”

“Which one?”

“A new one. You haven’t seen it before.”

“Describe it to me.”

“Hmm, well, it’s pale blue. There’s black, ivy-patterned embroidered round the hems. Mid-thigh, sweetheart neckline, capped sleeves.”

“I’m sure you’re beautiful in it.”

Alice pressed the fingers of her free hand to her smile.

“What else are you wearing?”

“Um…” She looked herself over in the mirror. “A navy blue ribbon holding my hair back. Well, trying. I really miss your braiding skills.”

“What else?”

“Well, nothing. Except my underwear of course.”

“Describe this underwear to me,” Jasper drawled.

Alice licked her lips, grinning like a loon. “I’m not sure I remember,” she teased.

“Well, there’s an easy way to fix that. Take off the dress.”

“But that wouldn’t be fair, would it?” she said coyly. “Me nearly-naked here, and you fully-dressed over there. No, no, _no_. I want those jeans, boots and shirt off in exchange, mister.”

“Well,” Jasper said with clearly-faked reluctance, “I _suppose_ that’s fair enough.”

She could hear the slight rustle of fabric across the line, the thud of boots being tossed aside. She giggled for a moment, hardly believing they were _doing_ this. But then she shrugged and sat up, stripping her dress off and laying it over the back of a chair where it wouldn’t wrinkle.

“Do you remember now, darlin’?”

Alice looked down —not that she’d _really_ forgotten of course— and hummed. “White lace, little purple bows on the sides. You know the one.”

Jasper groaned. “Sheer. Front-clasping.”

“That’s right.” She’d aimed for a chirpy tone but it had come out a little bit breathier.

“And are you wearing the matching panties? Those barely-there things.”

Alice trailed a hand across her hip. The purple satin ribbon was smooth under her fingertips. The lace it threaded through was a little rougher. She liked the contrast.

“You’re touching them,” Jasper murmured, surprising her at first until she remembered: vampire hearing.

“I am,” she whispered back. The earlier giddiness had faded and her tone was unintentionally breathless, seductive, as she asked, “Anywhere else you’d like me to touch?”

“Fuck,” Jasper said. He gave a strained laugh. “We really gonna do this?”

Alice took a deep breath, held it, then let it out slowly. “Yeah, I think we are. I just… I’ve missed you. A lot.”

“I know. Me too.” Jasper cleared his throat. “So, then. Unclip that pretty bra of yours Alice.”

Her fingers found the clasp in front and unhooked it.

“Good,” Jasper murmured.

“Should I take it off?”

“No, no need.” His tone was deep, dark, smooth. “I wanna picture you with it hanging off your shoulders, open, pushed apart and framing your breasts.”

Alice swallowed. “Okay,” she whispered.

“Put your hands on your stomach for me sweetheart.”

Alice fumbled a bit, before wedging the phone between her shoulder and her ear. Her hands settled hesitantly on her stomach, just over her belly button.

“Now, slowly smooth them upwards. Slowly. No rush.”

“What about you?” she asked.

There was a husky chuckle. “Oh darlin’, you asked me to take my jeans off.”

“Oh,” she realised, because Jasper wasn’t generally one for underwear. “You’re naked.”

“I am. And while your hands are smoothing up— How far have you gotten sweetheart?”

“Um, just under…”

“Hmm, cup them for me, but don’t touch your nipples.”

Alice closed her eyes and did so. “Your hands?”

“Right. While yours are wandering upwards darlin’, mine are wandering down. They’re on my thighs now. You know how hard it is not to touch myself, listening to every hitch of your breathing, every brush of your hands on your skin, imagining what you look like right now?” Then he said, “Pinch your nipples for me. Gently.”

She did so without thought, and let out a soft cry.

“Yes, fuck, just like that.” Jasper took a deep, unneeded breath. “Where are you?”

She looked around. “Um, in, in my hotel room. On my bed.”

“Lie down for me. Good, good,” he crooned, obviously hearing her move. “Now pinch a little harder sweetheart. Can you do that for me?”

“Oh! Yes, I—”

“Now roll them between your fingers.”

Alice did so, tossing her head back and shutting her eyes again. She’d started this as a joke, yes, and never expected it to go anywhere. But if she had, she didn’t think she could have anticipated how _erotic_ it was. She was alone but for Jasper’s voice, his direction, his commands, telling her how to pleasure herself.

She _liked_ it.

A lot.

“I can hear it, you know,” Jasper murmured in her ear. “The bedsprings, creaking just slightly. What’s making them creak, darlin’?”

She frowned, unsure, and so blinked her eyes open. She stared up at her own reflection for a few uncomprehending moments, hardly able to believe that heavy-lidded, sensual woman was really her. Then her gaze dragged down her form, and she realised—

“My hips,” she confessed. “They’re…”

“Moving? Rocking? Like they would if I was making love to you?”

“Y-yes.”

“You _want_ , don’t you?”

“ _Yes_.”

“Take off your panties for me.”

Alice’s breath caught. She hurried to obey. She lifted her hips and shoved the lace down, wriggling till they were over her knees, her ankles, and finally kicked aside. She didn’t much care where they had ended up. Her hands fluttered over her body, not sure whether to touch.

“On those restless hips,” Jasper said in a husky tone, as if sensing her uncertainty. “Your hands. Rest them there. Now drag your nails down your thighs for me. Yes, just like that. How you feeling right now darlin’?”

Alice huffed, half-laugh half-moan. “On fire. I feel on fire. I wanna touch myself. Won’t you let me touch myself?”

He hissed.

“Jasper?”

“Right,” he said roughly. “Restraint. Gone.”

Alice’s breath caught. “Are you—”

“Touching _my_ self? Oh yeah.”

“Can I?”

Jasper groaned. “Will you say pretty please?” he joked.

“Pretty please,” she said at once. “Please, please, please can I touch myself?”

Another, deeper groan. “Yes, fuck, okay. Just. Bring one hand back up darling. Back up to those lovely breasts of yours.”

“Uh-huh.”

“You know what to do there. Just how I told you before.”

“Yeah, I—” She bit her lip and moaned faintly, pinching first, gently then more insistent, occasionally rolling the taut bud between her fingertips. “Jasper,” she sighed.

“Good, sweetheart. You’re so good,” Jasper said in a low, rough tone. “Your other hand, slide it down, between those _other_ lips of yours. How does it feel?”

Alice bit her lip, and confessed, “Slick. Wet.” She giggled when Jasper cursed. But then she was suddenly able to hear the rhythmic sounds of Jasper’s hand, working himself, and she moaned as a finger slipped across her clit.

“There. Touch yourself there again.”

“ _Just_ there?” Alice asked. “I want—”

“I think I know what you want.” Jasper’s voice was sinfully deep, underscored by a low growl. “And you know I’d never leave you wanting sweetheart, right?”

“Never,” she agreed. He never had. He always … satisfied.

“So slide a finger up inside yourself for me.”

She whined.

“Another?”

“Yes, yes.”

“Another. You know what to do now. And the heel of your palm,” he grit out, the sounds of friction on his end growing faster, more desperate. “Grind it against your clit.”

Alice threw her head back, moaning. She thrust her fingers into herself as deep as she could, over and over, heel of her palm grinding just how Jasper said. Her other hand was desperate at her breast, pinching harder and harder at her nipple, tugging it sharply. But it wasn’t enough.

“I need, I need,” she stammered.

“You need to _come_ for me now,” Jasper growled.

And just like that, Alice’s back arched off the bed, her breath caught in a near-silent scream as she came. And in her ear, she heard Jasper groan loud and long and knew she wasn’t the only one.

It was long moments before Alice came back to herself, breathing finally beginning to slow and calm. Jasper was crooning soothing nonsense into her ear, just to let her know he was still there. She blinked dazedly, and when she realised what she was looking at —the reflection of herself, flushed with afterglow, one hand buried between her thighs and the other cupping her a breast with a worried-red nipple— she found herself giggling even as her cheeks flushed redder.

“Alright sweetheart?” Jasper asked in a fond tone.

“ _So_ alright,” she confided.

He laughed. Then, after a moment’s pause, asked, “Is that blue ribbon still in your hair?”

“Mhmm. Just barely.”

“Take it out and tie it around your wrist.”

Confused, Alice nonetheless sleepily obeyed. It looped thrice around her wrist before she tied the end in a bow.

“I want you to leave it there and, every time you see it, to think of me.”

Alice smiled sleepily. “Okay,” she said, then paused to yawn. “That sounds nice.”

“You’re tired,” Jasper said softly.

“Yeah.”

“Go to sleep sweetheart. I love you.”

“Hmm. Love you too.”

* * *

The next morning, Sirius gave Alice a suspicious look when she joined them for breakfast in the hotel dining room. Well, _she_ had breakfast. They just pretended so as to keep her company.

“Morning,” she chirped.

“Something’s different,” Sirius said, eyes narrowed. “I don’t know what, but I think I don’t like it.”

Peter looked up from the newspaper he’d been graffitiing with impromptu moustaches on faces, and cocked an eyebrow. “She looks like she got laid,” he said bluntly, making Sirius’s eyes bug out.

“ _Peter_ ,” Alice hissed. She _tried_ to look angry, she really did. But her wide smile and flushed cheeks just wouldn’t cooperate.

“I’d ask if I should be angry on Jasper’s behalf, but my inner Miss Cleo says you had a lengthy —and probably very naughty— phone call from the Major last night.” He waggled his eyebrows and smirked. “Am I right?”

“No,” Sirius whimpered. “Peter, I thought we were _pals_. Why would you _say that in front of me_?”

“’Cause I knew your reaction would be fucking hilarious,” Peter said unrepentantly, grinned, and then went back to scribbling a unibrow on the face of an officious looking woman on the front page.

Sirius, meanwhile, tried with little success to garrotte himself with the tablecloth.

Alice rolled her eyes at both of them. She turned her attention back to breakfast, though her gaze often wandered to her beribboned wrist, bringing a secret smile to her lips.

* * *

Soon enough Peter’s ‘banishment’ was lifted and he said his goodbyes and headed back home to his mate’s side.

This left Sirius and Alice on their own. Somehow, seemingly a natural progression, their travel route left America behind and they found themselves heading towards England, Alice apparating both them past those pesky border and custom checks.

“Weird, right?” Sirius said.

“ _Really_ weird,” Alice agreed.

They were standing side-by-side on a sidewalk in London, on Charing Cross Road to be precise. Their heads were cocked at identical perplexed angles, and their faces screwed up in similar expressions of distaste. They were staring at an accountant’s office.

“It’s like the _opposite_ of the Leaky Cauldron, the opposite of magical. It’s all numbers and order and boring muggle stuff.”

Alice nodded. “I … don’t like it. Let’s go somewhere else?”

Sirius grimaced and agreed.

A short time later they found themselves on a bench in one of London’s parks, taking advantage of the overcast sky and throwing bread to ducks.

“So…” Sirius finally said.

Alice gave him a sidelong look. “You’re uncomfortable. You’re almost never uncomfortable. You’re too shameless for it.” She considered those facts. “That leaves two possibilities, and one’s more likely to have you screeching in horror and clawing at your eyes, if past experience is to be trusted.”

Sirius shuddered, and visibly repressed the implied ‘Alice and sex’ subject.

“Which means this is about that topic you’ve studiously avoided since I mentioned it.”

“I haven’t been _avoiding_. There’s nothing _to_ avoid. I am calm and composed and _in control_.”

Alice snorted. “Sirius, you had a heart attack.” She paused. “Well, a psychosomatic heart attack, according to Carlisle.”

“…Okay, fine, maybe not _completely_ calm. But it’s kind of a big deal!”

“Yes, I _do_ realise that.”

“I just…” Sirius huffed and threw out another handful of bread. “Are you _sure_?”

“No. You know I’m not. Hence the ‘still thinking about it’ thing.”

“Right. Of course.” He tossed away the last of his bread and then slumped back on the bench, hands in his pockets. “I don’t want to lose you,” he confessed.

She frowned. “Do you mean to magic-loss prompted suicide, or my mortality?”

Sirius gave a sad chuckle. “Exactly.” He took a deep breath and straightened, turning towards her with a rare sober expression. “Anything you need to know about—” He swallowed hard. “About losing your magic. Anything you need to know to help you make your choice, just ask. And anything you’ll need to deal with _whatever_ you decide, I’ll give that too.”

Alice blinked back tears, then leaned over to give him a sideways hug. “You’re kind of the most awesome godfather in multiple universes, you know that right?”

“Yeah?” he chuckled, pleased, hugging her back.

“Without a doubt. And … there _are_ a couple of things that you could help me with. Things that’d make my choice easier.”

Sirius didn’t hesitate. “Name it.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Before I continue, I’ve got two possible paths for this fic to go from here. I say two, because my initial plan was that Alice loses her magic like Sirius but keeps a gift (prophecy in her case—duh). But I’ve had quite a few messages from people who aren’t totally cool with that idea.
> 
> So I put it to you, dear readers. There’s a poll over on [my FFNet profile page](https://www.fanfiction.net/u/780029/Nia-River), or just let me know in a comment, whatever.
> 
> DO YOU WANT ALICE TO KEEP HER MAGIC? Y/N?


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